Thursday nights around here are date nights, it’s the one night during the season that Eric is home for dinner. We usually stay home and have a home cooked meal, spend time catching up with each other from the week, watch our favorite shows and gear up for game day. For as many times as I have said, “Hey we should go out this week!”, we always end up choosing to stay home, and those are my favorite kind of nights. I look forward to Thursday each week and try to have some type of dinner planned for us. Sometimes I make an easy dinner, and sometimes I go all out. Last week I decided to go for middle ground, and made some Salsa Verde chicken enchiladas. They include a little prep time, but are easy to put together. I hate being stuck in the kitchen when Eric is home; we try to get in as much hang time as we can on those precious Thursday nights.

Once I got all the prepping out of the way for the enchiladas; we poured ourselves a drink and waited for them to bake up!

I could tell they were ready when I could smell them in the living room and they started making my stomach growl!

I loved the difference in texture, the ends were a little crisp, cheese on the inside and out was hot and perfectly melty. The chicken has lots of flavor in this recipe from the cumin and Mexican oregano and I happened to have almost all of the ingredients on hand. I love recipes like that!

Salsa Verde Chicken Enchiladas

Makes 8 enchiladas 

Preheat oven to 350°F

Ingredients
2 medium chicken breasts
Salt for water
1 (16 ounce jar) salsa verde, divided
2 cups shredded pepper jack cheese, divided
1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
1 teaspoon garlic salt
1/2 teaspoon mexican oregano (I found it in the Hispanic aisle)
1/2 teaspoon hot mexican chili powder
8 soft taco flour tortillas

Preparation
Bring a pot of water to a boil and add salt for flavor. Add the chicken breasts, reduce the heat and cover. Simmer for about 20 minutes. Once the chicken is just cooked through, remove and shred the chicken with two forks.

In a medium sized mixing bowl add the shredded chicken breasts, 1/2 of the salsa verde (about 8 ounces), 1 cup of the shredded cheese, cumin, garlic salt, mexican oregano, and hot mexican chili powder . Stir the ingredients until thoroughly combined.

Grease a 9×12 inch baking dish with baking spray and dish a spoonful or two of salsa into the bottom and spread around evenly.

Fill each tortilla with about 1/3 cup chicken mixture down the center, roll, and lay in the dish seam side down. Pour the remaining 8 ounces of salsa on top of enchiladas, and sprinkle with remaining 1 cup shredded cheese.

Bake for about 25 minutes until enchiladas are light golden brown and the cheese is melted.

Serve immediately with your toppings of choice; we love sour cream, and hot sauce.