My favorite homemade enchilada sauce recipe is easy to make with pantry ingredients, it only requires about 5 minutes of prep time, and it tastes so flavorful and delicious.
My best tip for kicking your homemade enchiladas up a delicious notch?
Use this homemade enchilada sauce! ♡
This recipe for Southwestern-style red enchilada sauce has been the starring ingredient in my favorite enchilada recipe for years and years. And every time I bake up a batch of enchiladas for a gathering, friends always ask for the recipe.
By contrast to many Mexican-style enchilada sauces, this recipe does not include tomatoes but rather centers its flavor around a rich blend of seasonings that you likely already have in your pantry (chili powder, cumin, garlic and oregano). On its own, the sauce is naturally fairly mild, although you are welcome to amp up the heat if you’d like. And its deliciously warm, toasty, earthy flavors pair perfectly with any variety of enchilada recipes.
The good news too is that this recipe only takes about 5 minutes to prep, plus an additional 15-ish minutes to simmer on the stove. It’s naturally vegetarian, vegan and can also be made gluten-free if you’d like. It’s made entirely with pantry ingredients, and can be customized to be more spicy, smoky, tomato-y, or even creamy if you prefer. And I must say — it’s a million times better than the canned stuff!
Thousands of our readers have made and loved this recipe over the years. So if you have yet to give it a try, I say it’s time!
Homemade Enchilada Sauce Recipe | 1-Minute Video
Homemade Red Enchilada Sauce Ingredients:
To make this easy enchilada sauce recipe, you will need the following ingredients:
- Oil and flour: These will form the roux to thicken the sauce. You’re welcome to use any type of neutral-flavored oil (or butter) that you prefer. And while I typically use all-purpose flour, you are welcome to sub in a 1-for-1 GF flour blend instead to make this recipe gluten-free.
- Chili powder: For all of our international readers, please note that this recipe calls for American-style chili powder, which is actually a blend of various chilis and seasonings, including a typically small percentage of cayenne. (Most chili powders sold outside of the States are 100% cayenne, which will not work for this recipe.) I recommend investing in a good-quality brand of chili powder for this recipe, since it is the primary seasoning for this sauce. But keep in mind that chili powder blends vary from brand to brand, so it’s worth experimenting with a few to find the one that you love best!
- Garlic powder, ground cumin, dried oregano: These are the other dried seasonings that we will use in the sauce. Feel free to increase the amount of any one of these once you have tasted the sauce, if you would like.
- Veggie or chicken stock: I also recommend using some good-quality stock in this recipe, which will add a delicious depth of flavor to the sauce.
- Fine sea salt: And finally, don’t forget to season the sauce! I typically add in about 1/2 teaspoon, but the amount needed will likely depend significantly on the brand and saltiness of the stock that you use.
How To Make Enchilada Sauce:
Here are the basic steps for how to make enchilada sauce (full instructions included in the recipe box below):
- Cook the roux and spices: In a small saucepan, we’ll first cook the flour and oil together to form the roux, and then whisk in the spices to briefly toast them in the saucepan before adding in the stock.
- Simmer: Gradually add in the stock while whisking the sauce, in order to blend in any lumps. Then bring the sauce to a simmer and let it cook (you want to maintain a low bubble) for 10-15 minutes, or until it has reduced to your desired thickness.
- Season: Season with salt (or any extra seasonings that you might like to add) to taste.
- Serve: Then serve it up in a pan of enchiladas or whatever recipe sounds good…and enjoy!
Possible Variations:
This recipe is quite flexible, so please feel free to tinker around with ingredient amounts and customize it however you prefer! For example, you could…
- Make it gluten-free: You can either use an 1-for-1 gluten-free flour blend, in place of the AP flour. Or you can omit the flour and instead add a cornstarch slurry (equal parts cornstarch and cold water whisked together) to the sauce once it is simmering to thicken it.
- Make it creamy: Whisk in 1/2 cup of heavy cream to turn this recipe into a delicious creamy enchilada sauce.
- Make it spicier: Feel free to add in a pinch or two of cayenne to make this sauce even spicier. Or alternately, you can choose to use ancho chili powder in place of standard American chili powder, which has a smokier and slightly spicier flavor.
- Make it milder: American chili powder should naturally be quite mild. But if you are wary of heat, feel free to start with 2 tablespoons (instead of 4 tablespoons) of chili powder in the recipe. Then once the sauce has simmered, give it a taste and feel free to add more if you would like.
- Make it smokier: Feel free to swap some of the American chili powder for chipotle chili powder, if you would like this sauce to have a smoky chipotle kick. (Also note that chipotle powder is considerably spicier, so this version would pack more heat too.)
- Add tomato sauce: If you would like to have a more tomato-y enchilada sauce, you are welcome to add a few tablespoons of tomato paste to the sauce.
Ways To Use Enchilada Sauce:
Here are a few of my favorite ways to use this easy enchilada sauce:
- Enchiladas: This red sauce works on just about any kind of enchiladas, such as my favorite chicken enchiladas, beef enchiladas, or roasted cauliflower enchilada.
- Soups: Enchilada sauce is a fantastic way to season soups, such as my slow cooker chicken enchilada soup, cheesy chicken enchilada soup, or sweet potato enchilada soup.
- Casseroles: If you don’t feel like rolling up your enchiladas, try ‘stacking’ them into a casserole, such as this chicken enchilada casserole (one of our readers’ favorite recipes!).
- Nachos, Cups, Skillets and More: I also love using this sauce in other enchilada-inspired recipes, such as my easy enchilada cups, chicken enchilada nachos and this easy enchilada skillet.
Red Enchilada Sauce
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons avocado oil or olive oil
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
- 1/4 cup chili powder (see note below)
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1/4 teaspoon dried oregano
- 2 cups chicken or vegetable stock
- fine sea salt, to taste
Instructions
- Cook the roux and spices: Heat oil in a small saucepan over medium-high heat. Add flour and cook for 1 minute, whisking constantly. Add in the chili powder, garlic powder, cumin and oregano and cook for 1 more minute, whisking constantly.
- Simmer: Gradually pour in the stock, whisking constantly to combine until no lumps remain. Continue cooking until the sauce reaches a simmer. Then reduce heat to medium-low to maintain the simmer (the sauce should continue lightly bubbling) for about 10-15 minutes, uncovered, until the sauce has slightly thickened.
- Season: Give the sauce a taste and season with salt, as needed. (I typically add 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt, but the saltiness of the sauce can vary depending on the brand of stock that you use.)
- Serve: Use immediately in your favorite recipe and enjoy!
Notes
Did you make this?Let me know how it turned out in the comments below!
I live in a country where I can’t buy enchilada sauce and I love Mexican food, so I’ve been looking for a recipe to make it for a while. This is the best! Thanks
Hi, thank you for sharing the recipe. I will like to make a comment for people that are fan of Mexican food but can’t tolerate such a spice recipe. This recipe is really spice! If you would like to use it please keep in mind that 1/4 cup of chili powder is A Lot! FIRE! So start slowly with the powder and taste
This is absolutely, plate-cleaningly, delicious! The sauce was used to make bean and cheese skillet enchiladas, all of which were gobbled up in mere minutes. My 15-year-old son said the enchiladas were better than the ones we get at restaurants. I whole-heartedly credit the success of our supper to your recipe. THANK YOU!
Oh. Wow. This sauce is delicious and so easy to make. Thanks!
To make it low carb you can use a teaspoon or so of xanthum gum instead of flour. Our little boy is a type 1 diabetic so we nixed the tortillas ans he was able to have this without insulin and it didn’t spike his bg. Thanks for the recipe!
I made recipe exactly as written, using the same chili powder and used only half as much chili powder. it was very, very bitter and didn’t remind me at all of enchilada sauce.
I added some honey to the sauce. It didn’t sweeten it as much as it took away the bite.
How do you complain when you didn’t even use the recipe right of course all the flavor won’t be their if you take away half of the flavor
I also found this to be very bitter and I did make it as directed. Tried again today but reduced it to 2 T of chili powder and liked it much more.
Looking into this, I likely toasted the spices too long the first time around. Apparently chiles get bitter if cooked too long! Try cutting down the time you cook the spices or adding the chile powder in after the sauce has reduced some. Fixed the problem for me!
There are many options for red chili powder. Some can be quite bitter. I purchase red chili powder from 2 locations: Hatch, NM and Chimayo, NM. I “discovered” Chimayo red and green when I started visiting NM at least annually in 1990. We drove the northern route from Las Vegas, through Santa Fe, and back. Chimayo red tends to be sweet and smoky; not bitter. It is still a favorite of mine. Then I found mild red in Hatch. I had been purchasing whole, frozen roasted green chilies in Hatch but I bought a gallon ziplock bag of mild red and I am hooked. You can find it online and I like the fact that I am supporting the growers directly. Store-bought simply does not compare. I like to add a small amount of ancho (and it is mild) as well as ground chipotle as well to give a very complex flavor. This recipe is excellent! One of the best I’ve made.
I’m making mine as I read the comments and I saw on another recipe that they used about 2-3 tablespoons of apple cider vinegar to help with the chili powder bitterness. I’ll see. Mine is still cooking. I have 5 minutes to go and it’s not thickening. I’ll wait and see though. Finished cooking. Didn’t really thicken like I thought it would. It taste ok and that could be my fault because I added the vinegar and a little tomato paste.
I did this recipe and added chipotle peppers and it was amazing. Thank you!
This is definitely a keeper, just delicious! I recently had dinner with some friends and we were talking food and I mentioned that I had made your enchilada sauce, my friend said OMG she was getting ready to make this the next day, it is the best!
This sauce might have been the best thing to happen to me in 2020. I’ve made this recipe 5 times since finding it a month ago.
So easy and so good! I threw in 1 Tbsp. of tomato paste, just because! Threw out my old recipe!
We will never use a packet mix again. I usually make double to put into the freezer for a mid week special.
This sauce is great. I make double and freeze half. Kids love my enchiladas.
I recommend adding some tomato paste to it. Works really well.