By Cate Wells

However you spell it, chiliquiles are a traditional Mexican dish that can be cooked in dozens of delicious ways—but the key ingredients are tortillas, cheese, and either a red or green sauce. It’s a great way to use up stale tortillas and leftover cooked chicken. They are reputedly a good hangover cure and a popular brunch dish, but equally good for dinner. So, how about breaking up with boring cooking and moving on from another dull taco night?

My chiliquiles are made with a double batch of my Salsa Verde, a sauce made with tomatillos, green fruit with a papery husk somewhere between tomatoes and gooseberries. This casserole version also has some added vegetable goodness with zucchinis to balance out all the cheese, plus some chile to keep in hot and spicy. For more heat from this latin love, add more jalapenos or try a serrano chile in the salsa verde. Click through for the full Chiliquiles Verdes con Pollo recipe.


Salsa Verde:
1 pound tomatillos
2 bunches green onions
1–3 jalapeno pepper
1 cup cilantro

1 zucchini, sliced
12 small corn tortillas, cut or shredded into smaller pieces (slightly stale is preferred)
4 cups cooked chicken, shredded (again leftover is great, but you can also buy one of those rotisserie birds)
1 pound mozzarella, chopped into strips (or queso fresca or sour cream)
1 cup half-and-half

1. Prepare Salsa Verde. Preheat broiler. Prepare tomatillos: Remove papery husk and rinse well. Cut into quarters, or halves if large. Broil tomatillos for 5-8 minutes until soft and slightly blackened.
2. While tomatillos are broiling, prepare the green onions by removing dark green part and roots and jalapeno pepper by removing stem and seeds.
3. In food processor, blend tomatillos, green onions, peppers, and cilantro until coarsely chopped.
4. Preheat oven to 450′. In a 9×13 baking dish, start layering the ingredients as you would lasagna. Start with overlapped tortillas, followed by chicken, zucchini, cheese, and more salsa verde.
5. Repeat layers two–three times. Pour half-and-half over dish.
6. Bake 25 minutes until bubbling. Cool for 10 minutes. Makes 8 servings.

What do you think are key ingredients to Chiliquiles? And, do you prefer that spelling or chilaguiles, chile quiles, or something else?