Homemade Enchilada sauce is easy to make with fresh organic produce from your garden, or local farmers market. This recipe is a great option for canning if you are working to store food, or use up vegetables from your garden harvest.
Homemade sauces are an excellent way to cut down on added sugars, additives and chemicals that are found in most store bought options. There is also a noticeable improvement in flavor richness and texture when you make your own from scratch.
We have a deep commitment for using our garden harvest efficiently every year and we have many tips and tricks for helping you do the same. Homemade sauces are easy to store, save you money in your budget and are very easy to whip up. For this recipe we are combining fresh vine grown tomatoes, our greenhouse grown peppers, chili powder and various other spices to bring a full bodied enchilada sauce that we know you will love.
What is traditional enchilada sauce made of?
Despite what most of us are accustomed to, traditional authentic enchilada sauce is made of dried chilis, garlic, salt and Mexican chocolate! It has a very different flavor than the more commonly known tomato based sauces that you regularly find.
How do you make enchilada sauce with fresh tomatoes?
Using fresh tomatoes for a homemade enchilada sauce is very easy and always our preferred method.
- Wash your tomatoes and remove the stems
- In a deep skillet or dutch oven heat oil, garlic and onions until translucent and fragrant
- Add the remaining ingredients and seasonings allowing everything to cook until soft
- Transfer to a food processor or use an immersion blender to puree completely
What is the difference between taco sauce and enchilada sauce?
While they are similar in how they are prepared, and share some ingredients, there are a few very distinct differences in taco sauce and enchilada sauce. The main differences come from the seasonings. Enchilada sauce derives it’s heat from fresh or dried chili peppers, while taco sauce uses cayenne pepper.
Taco sauce also includes paprika and enchilada sauce depends on chili powder for its depth of flavor. We tend to lean toward convenience and efficiency in our cooking rather than prioritizing traditional recipe rules. We enjoy playing around with spice combinations and utilizing what we have on hand, especially when preparing food for storage, and harvesting our garden crops.
Homemade sauces will help in your food budget
What are some different enchilada sauces?
There are many ways to change up the flavor profile in your homemade enchilada sauce. It’s an enjoyable liberty you have when you make your own. Some ideas are
- Tomatillo cilantro
- Fire roasted tomato
- Green chili verde
- Fresh jalapeno
- Authentic Mexican chocolate enchilada sauce
- Sour cream white enchilada sauce
- Pico de guillo style sauce
Homemade Enchilada Sauce Recipe:
Instructions:
- In a large skillet, heat coconut oil over medium heat. Add chopped onions, peppers and garlic. Simmer about five minutes until onions are translucent,
- about 10 minutes.
- Pour onions and garlic into the carafe of a blender and add tomatoes, chili powder, cayenne or hot sauce, cumin, oregano, rosemary, lemon juice, salt, and pepper.
- Puree the sauce until completely smooth.
- Clean the skillet to remove any leftover onions.
- Pour the pureed sauce into the cleaned skillet and bring to medium heat. Lower heat and simmer for 15 minutes. adjust seasonings to taste.
- It’s Ready to pour over enchiladas, freeze or can.
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Homemade Enchilada Sauce
No more commercially canned sauce, once you learn to make it from scratch. This is a delicious and nutritious, homemade enchilada sauce. This recipe would make a nice foodie gift!
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons coconut oil
- 1 onion, chopped (about 2 cups)
- 4 to 5 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 14.5- ounce cans diced tomatoes or about five medium fresh tomatoes-chopped.
- 2 fresh medium hot or mild roasting peppers chopped. I'm using our greenhouse Tiburon peppers. heat level 2.*
- 2 tablespoons chili powder
- 1 tablespoon hot sauce or cayenne pepper, I'm using Frank's hot sauce today
- 2 teaspoons cumin
- 2 tablespoons freshly chopped fresh oregano leaves
- 1 teaspoon freshly chopped fresh rosemary leaves
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice, about 1/2 of a fresh lemon
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon freshly-ground black pepper
Instructions
- In a large skillet, heat coconut oil over medium heat. Add chopped onions, fresh peppers and garlic. Simmer until translucent,
- about 10 minutes.
- Pour onions and garlic into the carafe of a blender and add tomatoes, chili powder, cayenne or hot sauce, cumin, oregano, rosemary, lemon juice, salt, and pepper.
- Puree the sauce until completely smooth.
- Clean the skillet to remove any leftover onions.
- Pour the pureed sauce into the cleaned skillet and bring to medium heat. Lower heat and simmer for 15 minutes. adjust seasonings to taste.
- It's Ready to pour over enchiladas, freeze or can.
Notes
This recipe is easy with a food processor or blender. If you have neither hand chopping will work great too but take a bit longer.
*For a deeper flavor you can choose to use fresh or canned fire roasted peppers or oven roasted peppers as I show you here.
Nutrition Information
Yield
8Serving Size
1Amount Per Serving Calories 82Total Fat 4gSaturated Fat 3gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 1gCholesterol 0mgSodium 421mgCarbohydrates 11gFiber 4gSugar 5gProtein 2g
Homemade Enchilada Sauce
No more commercially canned sauce, once you learn to make it from scratch. This is a delicious and nutritious, homemade enchilada sauce. This recipe would make a nice foodie gift!
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons coconut oil
- 1 onion, chopped (about 2 cups)
- 4 to 5 cloves garlic, minced
- 2 14.5- ounce cans diced tomatoes or about five medium fresh tomatoes-chopped.
- 2 fresh medium hot or mild roasting peppers chopped. I'm using our greenhouse Tiburon peppers. heat level 2.*
- 2 tablespoons chili powder
- 1 tablespoon hot sauce or cayenne pepper, I'm using Frank's hot sauce today
- 2 teaspoons cumin
- 2 tablespoons freshly chopped fresh oregano leaves
- 1 teaspoon freshly chopped fresh rosemary leaves
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice, about 1/2 of a fresh lemon
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon freshly-ground black pepper
Instructions
- In a large skillet, heat coconut oil over medium heat. Add chopped onions, fresh peppers and garlic. Simmer until translucent,
- about 10 minutes.
- Pour onions and garlic into the carafe of a blender and add tomatoes, chili powder, cayenne or hot sauce, cumin, oregano, rosemary, lemon juice, salt, and pepper.
- Puree the sauce until completely smooth.
- Clean the skillet to remove any leftover onions.
- Pour the pureed sauce into the cleaned skillet and bring to medium heat. Lower heat and simmer for 15 minutes. adjust seasonings to taste.
- It's Ready to pour over enchiladas, freeze or can.
Notes
This recipe is easy with a food processor or blender. If you have neither hand chopping will work great too but take a bit longer.
*For a deeper flavor you can choose to use fresh or canned fire roasted peppers or oven roasted peppers as I show you here.
Nutrition Information
Yield
8Serving Size
1Amount Per Serving Calories 82Total Fat 4gSaturated Fat 3gTrans Fat 0gUnsaturated Fat 1gCholesterol 0mgSodium 421mgCarbohydrates 11gFiber 4gSugar 5gProtein 2g
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Follow Us:
We enjoy meeting you on our social networks. Follow us on Facebook, Pinterest, Instagram . Tag us with your pictures of our recipes and comment on how it went for you. We would love to see what you do with them.
We often like, comment and share your posts of our recipes on our daily Instagram stories.
Ask questions and rate the recipe in the comments section below. Please share what you did with this recipe. We are always looking for more and better ways to make homemade food. Other cooks love your ideas!
Recent Posts:
John Robert
Saturday 1st of October 2022
A nice sauce. Cooked with fresh poblanos..just the right amount of zing. For Chile powder used half mild, half picante. Used for Vegetable enchiladas. The recipe scaled nicely at 5x (I cook for the elderly and ill every Sunday) Thanks so much for sharing this recipe. John Robert Small https://www.Buymeacoffee.com/johnrobertK
Diane
Sunday 2nd of October 2022
Thank you for the feedback John. I'm so glad you and your seniors enjoyed it. God bless!
John Robert
Friday 30th of September 2022
I don't see a reference to the roasting peppers in the direction? When to add? Cooked? Chopped? THANKS JRS
Diane
Friday 30th of September 2022
Hi John, Thanks for pointing out the omission. I have updated the recipe and put in a note in the notes section that you may find useful on the peppers.Enjoy!
John Robert
Wednesday 28th of September 2022
How much sauce does this make please? (Cups or equivalent - "servings" is a very relative term). THANKS..looks like a great recipe
Diane
Wednesday 28th of September 2022
Hi John, Count on getting about a quart out of this recipe as written. The size of vegetables you use will make a difference here. Especially if you use real tomatoes in place of the canned. Fresh tomatoes can also impact how thick or thin the sauce is since some varieties of tomatoes are fleshier than others. I hope you let us know if you give it a try. thanks for the you questing and have a great day!
Abigail
Tuesday 25th of August 2020
Do you peel the tomatoes for this recipe?
Diane
Tuesday 25th of August 2020
Hi Abigail, If you are using fresh tomatoes you can put them in the blender and not peel them. The skin should pulverize with the other ingredients. You could take the extra time to blanch the tomatoes. Let them cool and peel off the skins if you wish. I don't find that necessary. Hope this helps!
Crystal
Saturday 16th of September 2017
Im so excited to try this! We have so many tomatoes and we love enchiladas!! How would you go about canning this??
Diane
Saturday 16th of September 2017
Hi Crystal, This is an easy tasty sauce. I have not canned it and would worry about waterbath canning this sauce because it contains alkaline veggies and herbs. You would need to put the pint jars under 6 lbs of pressure for 20 minutes. Enjoy! This recipe has good canning instructions for you.