These Butternut Squash Vegan Enchiladas are smothered in a creamy, slightly spicy, and smokey Chipotle Cashew Cream Sauce. This is the recipe you want to make when pleasing a crowd of eaters, and they are secretly healthy, vegan, and gluten-free!
Confession: I do not like Mexican food.
For the love of chips and salsa, how is it even possible that the keepers of the internet let someone like me have a blog related to all things food when I do not even share the love for one of the most important culinary achievements of all time? I too ask myself these necessary life questions while lying in bed, awake, on sleepless nights.
But surely there are Mexican recipes on this blog. What about this Enchilada Lasagna, this Tamale Pie, and this Blood Orange Salsa? Those, dear reader, were created just for you despite my un-love of one of the world's favorite cuisines.
For all of my soul searching, I still cannot get behind the spicy, saucy, salsa-y stuff.
HOWEVER, I made this little dish here to use up some butternut squash that was near about to hit the dumpster if it wasn't cooked up in a jiffy. After perusing my fridge, looking over every last ingredient in search of greatness, searching for something, anything to make, the ingredients spoke, and vegan enchiladas it was. I think we are having a Mexican food breakthrough people, because I could not put my fork down. There were firsts, seconds, and fights over the the Vegan Enchilada leftovers. Progress.
Let's just talk about the sauce for a moment, because I think this is where the magic really happens in these Vegan Enchiladas. Sure, the filling is filled with all of my food dreams including sweet butternut squash, tender braised kale, and creamy pinto beans, but the sauce is where the magic happens. It is this creamy, smooth, velvety, love-child of cashews and chilis in adobo. Somehow these spicy and smokey little canned peppers, that are so nat a part of my regular food scene, are transformed into food greatness when blended with the humble cashew. And like 10 minutes. This sauce is blended up in 10 minutes.
Once blended, it is added to the filling for its creamy binding powers and then poured, in its glossy perfection, over each stuffed and rolled enchilada like the crown jewel of this enchilada situation that it is.
But what blogger in their right mind would be posting a Fall SQUASH recipe now that we are clearly into Christmas cookie territory? Apparently this one who is so excited about her non-food love of Mexican food that she had to (had to!) share it with her Mexican food loving internet friends - aka YOU. Sometimes you have to know when to break the rules and this is one of those times.
Plus! This recipe is great for feeding a crowd. And when do the most crowds need to be fed? This time of year. And what do the crowds (other than this strange human) like to eat? Mexican food. So, please accept my holiday gift of a non-holiday Mexican recipe to feed you and yours during this season.
And don't you even worry! Cookies will be coming later this week. Because, CHRISTMAS!
PrintButternut Squash Vegan Enchiladas with Chipotle Cashew Cream Sauce
- Yield: 5 1x
- Category: Main Course
Description
These Butternut Squash Vegan Enchiladas are smothered in a creamy, slightly spicy, and smokey Chipotle Cashew Cream Sauce. They are secretly healthy!
Ingredients
- 2 ½ cups cubed butternut squash
- 1 tablespoon chili powder
- 1 teaspoon cumin
- 1 tablespoon tomato paste
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 3 cups chopped kale
- 1 can pinto beans
- 10 Grain Free Paleo Tortillas (or other gluten free tortilla)
For the Chipotle Cashew Cream Sauce
- 2 cups raw cashews (soaked in water overnight)
- 4 chipotle peppers in adobo sauce (more or less to achieve desired spiciness)
- 2 cloved garlic
- 2 tbsp lime juive
- ½ teaspoon salt
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.
- Drain and rinse the soaked cashews and add them into a high speed blender. Add all the remaining Chipotle Cashew Cream ingredients and blend until smooth. Set aside.
- Add the squash and ½ cup water into a skillet. Cover and cook over medium heat until the squash is tender. Drain off any excess water and return the skillet to the heat.
- Add in the chili powder, cumin, tomato paste and salt. Sautee, stirring constantly, until the spices are fragrant, about 1-2 minutes. Add in the kale, pinto beans, and ½ cup of the chipotle cream sauce and cook until warmed through. Set aside.
- Spread a layer of the Chipotle Cream Sauce on the bottom of the baking dish. Fill each of the tortillas with the filling and roll. Place the rolled enchiladas into the baking dish. Top with the remaining Chipotle Cashew Cream. Bake for 30 minutes.
J says
Your intro is f*cking hilarious!! Very weLL written
It was the butternut squash Lentil loaf that lured Me here from PINTEREST... but a good lure... not like in a touristy town where there are employees trying to lure you into a haunted house, or a celebrity wax museum or a RIPLEY'S Believe it or not
Sure you most likely would see something cool or interesting, but it DOES not have that lasting appeal... Butternut squash lentil loaf however... wooo!!!!!!!! That was awesome thirty years ago, it's awesome now, AND it wiLL be awesome in a million years from now
ALAS I saved this recipe as well AND I will traipse around the site surely finding More
Thank You!!!!!!!!