Delia's Enchiladas with Cheese recipe...

According to the recipe analyser, this recipe contains 869 calories per serving (if you're using it as a main course for two, as suggested). Is that right? I know it would only be an estimation, but, really? I honestly never realised how calorific cheese was until now. And I love cheese.

that absolutely seems right...between the trotillas and the cheese and the beans...yeah enchiladas are pretty high in fat and calories.

There aren't any beans in that recipe :-)  It's the cheese that does it.   At over 100 cals per ounce any recipe with 9oz plus a liberal amount of creme fraiche is going to be high.  Big tortillas are 200 cals each and she's serving 2 each here. 

It says 'serves 4 as a starter' so you could halve all the quantities quite easily.  Plenty of green salad or some grilled vegetables on the side...  450-500 cals per portion that way.

You could leave out the creme fraiche and use evaporated fat free milk instead.  You could also use part skim mozzarella and a lower fat content cheddar.  That would go a long way towards cutting the calories.

I'll suggest halving it to the other half for next time (he does all the cooking), especially since I feel like I overate just now, though it was worth it. Might take some convincing.

How would the evaporated milk work? I've never used it for anything. Have to look at the mozzarellas, I don't think our big supermarket really has that many.

I guess I'm still getting used to just how calorific cheese is. When I was living at home I had it two meals a day. We used to get through an enourmous amount here too before we discovered there was food other than pizza and pasta with cheese (I'm veggie, he's not) and my metabolism stopped being the teenage eat everything and be ok kind. :)

Thanks for the tips.

You have to be really careful with cheese.  Calories aside, it's very high in salt.  It's also murder on your blood cholesterol levels - the bad sort.  I heard once 'cheese is a flavouring, not a food' and that's not a bad phrase to remember.  A 'serving' of cheese should be no more than 1oz a day.  Choose strongly flavoured cheese in your dishes and then you'll find a little goes a long way.

this recipe looks really good but enchiladas don't have to be fattening. 

Use corn tortillas instead of flour and instead of stuffing them with cheese use chicken meat or ground beef.  And than just sprinkle them with some cheese.  If you don't use the cheese at all and do not put sour cream on them then you have a meal that doesn't kill you when it comes to counting the calories. 

The way I make them is use corn tortillas and dip them in the enchilada sauce and then lightly fry the tortillas in a small amount of oil and than stuff them with chicken.  Then I use a little bit of cheese sprinkled on top and on the side a salad.  And that way I get my enchilada fix but I don't go overboard with the calories. 

1oz a day? Heh... I will definitely keep that in mind, I'm sure less cheese would definitely do us both good.

rob I'm vegetarian which is why we went for the cheesy enchiladas. Will have to try with some fake meat although that tends to be quite processed. Not too keen on corn tortillas but thanks for the tip :)

Try lazy enchiladas...instead of frying them, you bake them and you can use eggplant for your vegetarians.

Sorry didn't realize you were vegetarian. 

Corn toritllas have less calories than flour thats why I recommended them.

Use low fat  cheese and non fat sour cream than to help maintain the calories under control.  

Hope that helps. 

smwhipple - I'm guessing you mean for the long cooking part - the recipe calls for baking anyway :) Eggplant is good, never thought of putting them in an enchilada though.

No worries rob :) I appreciate the suggestions!