Chilaquiles Revenge!

Now, THIS is what you do when you have a ton of leftovers: Chilaquiles! I've made Chilaquiles before (thanks to my friend WWW),  but these were like Chilaquiles on steroids! Talk about a Mexican explosion in your mouth! Your ingredients may vary, depending on what you may have left to use up, but here's what I used:

• Ranchero sauce
• 4 corn tortillas (or use leftover tortilla chips!)
• Rotisserie chicken leftovers
• leftover bacon
• leftover fresh mango salsa
• black beans
• shredded smoked cheese
• barbecue sauce
• cojita cheese
• queso fresco
• chopped cilantro

For the ranchero sauce (I like to make this just to have on hand. It's great for times like this, and I use it for huevos rancheros as well.):

• 28 oz can peeled tomatoes (in JUICE, not sauce. Use the juice, do not drain.)
• 2 chipotles in adobo sauce
• about 2 Tablespoons of Canola oil
• small red onion, minced
• 2 large or 3 small garlic cloves, minced
• 1 1/2 cups chicken stock

In a blender or processor, pulse the tomatoes, reserved juice, and chipotles til liquefied.

Heat the oil in a deep skillet on med-high. Add the onion, cook till translucent. Add the garlic and cook for 1 min more. Lower heat if it's too hot.

Add the tomato mixture and simmer for 5 minutes. Add the stock, continuing to let it bubble on medium heat for about 20 minutes, until flavors blend and sauce is slightly thick. Season with salt. Add cilantro, remove from heat.

For the chilaquiles:

Heat a braiser or skillet on med-high. Add the corn tortillas and let them toast and harden. These will be your chips. Break apart, leave in the pan.  (You can also bake these at 350, if brushed with a little oil.) It's OK if they don't get totally hardened, you just want to dry them out a bit. The tortillas get limp when the ranchero sauce is added, anyway.

Add the ranchero sauce, watch for splattering. See my pan? Yeah. Splattering.

Add the rest of the ingredients, as you would layer a pizza. Some cheese, some chicken, some beans, more cheese, ending with the bacon and cilantro. Drizzle the BBQ sauce, and cover so the cheese melts. I topped with my mango salsa.

Serve family style. Only thing missing here was the sour cream to cool things off. But MAN was it great! Very spicy from the chipotles, so watch that heat of you don't like a lot of spice.

Now, you tell me. Have leftovers ever been better?