Easy Chicken Enchilada Casserole (With White Sauce)

• Easy layered enchilada recipe - Everyone needs a great chicken casserole recipe up in their sleeve to cook during busy weeknights (or at least one cheesy Mexican recipe). It has everything a great casserole for a crowd should have: thick and rich homemade cream of chicken soup sauce, shredded chicken (or use any leftover chicken), and plenty of toppings.
• Quick casserole - It only takes 25-30 minutes to assemble and bake this casserole!
• No special ingredients or Enchilada sauce needed! The best part is that you don't need it because this recipe is for easy chicken enchiladas and it's made with a 10-minute Gluten Free Cream of Chicken Soup (can be made ''with gluten'' too!). Homemade and healthy but If you want your dinner even faster, go for the store-bought cream of chicken (not recommended as high in sodium and plenty of other things!).

Layered Chicken Enchilada Casserole Ingredients

• Cooked shredded chicken - for a quick solution, start with rotisserie chicken, leftover chicken from last night's dinner, or slow cooker chicken with or without spices. If you have more time, use fresh chicken breasts or chicken thighs. Boil or bake these in the oven until cooked through. The chicken is ready when a kitchen thermometer inserted into the thickest part of the chicken registers 165 degrees Fahrenheit. Shred or dice cooked chicken into small pieces.
• Soft flour tortillas - both gluten-free (or non-gluten-free popular brands) or use corn tortillas. About 4 inches (10cm) in diameter. Get mini-size tortillas or cut the desired size yourself from a larger tortilla. Previously for larger tortillas, I've also cut these in half, smaller irregular parts or triangles.
• Sour cream sauce with cream of chicken soup - The sauce is made with this ''soup'', BUT it doesn't mean you can't mix things up. Add a few tablespoons of homemade enchilada sauce to the mix or use green enchilada sauce, green salsa instead (the last one goes very well with chicken).
• Cheddar cheese - use a Mexican cheese blend or combine 2-3 cheeses of your choice like Cheddar, Colby or Pepper Jack, Mozzarella, and Monterey Jack cheese for example. 
• Salt and black pepper - depending on which condensed cream you'll be using, make sure to taste for seasonings during cooking. The store-bought cream of chicken soup is usually very salty, so just be careful.
• Jalapenos - traditionally a white chicken enchilada is made with fresh or pickled green chilies. The flavor is somewhat similar in both of these, so you can easily substitute jalapenos with chilis.

• My shredded chicken tip - I like to buy rotisserie chicken on sale and shred it! Once they cool a bit, shred the meat, or cut it into bite-sized pieces, and lay it on parchment paper. Freeze the chicken for a few hours, then transfer to airtight bags. It stays good in the freezer for up to three months, perfect for various recipes!
• Make this casserole dairy-free - use your favorite vegan cheese, plant-based sour cream, or yogurt instead. For the cream of chicken soup, substitute the butter with vegan or coconut butter and use plant-based milk instead. You could even omit the cheese entirely in this recipe as the white sauce is what makes this casserole so flavorful and creamy.
• The tortillas will be softened after baking but still keep most of their shape. The longer casserole sits the softer the tortillas will become.
• This recipe can be doubled easily to feed a large crowd.
• For the cheese to melt better, grate it yourself rather than buying already pre-shredded cheese.
• You don't necessarily have to use this sauce, but it gives the best result in terms of creaminess and lets you control the amount of sodium that you can't when using a store-bought sauce. My favorite homemade Enchilada sauce or green enchilada sauce are also great substitutions for this casserole.

• When combining the sauce, I like to add ½ cup of sweet canned, frozen or fresh boiled/grilled corn, black beans, diced yellow or even green bell peppers, ½ cup of finely sliced (diced) mushrooms.
• Cook onion - Add  ½ of sweet or white onion (or 2 teaspoon onion powder), diced. If you have more prep time, cook it separately until translucent and transfer it to the sauce mix. Otherwise, just follow the recipe instructions.
• Chicken - substitute with slow cooker pulled beef or cooked ground beef of the same amount (4 cups). Have you tried my Beef Enchilada Casserole yet?
• Canned Jalapenos or mild green chiles - substitute with 4 ounce can of Green chilis. You can change the spice levels easily according to your family's needs. The flavor of this cheesy chicken enchilada casserole is mildly spicy so that the whole family can enjoy this great recipe. You can change the spice levels easily according to your family's needs. Although for very picky eaters I'd leave the peppers out completely.
• Spices. If you want to make it spicy try adding cayenne pepper, chili flakes to taste (mix it with the sauce). My favorite spices to add smoky flavor are also ground cumin, ground chipotle, chili powder.
• Traditional enchilada recipes require reheating the flour tortillas for easier rolling and stretchy texture. This is not needed here as we are going to cover them with layers and layers of chicken mixture and Cream of Chicken Soup sauce. I highly recommend making a double batch of sauce and making a chicken noodle soup, chicken pasta, for dinner the next day.
• Make it vegetarian - substitute chicken with canned beans (I like to use at least 2 different beans here such as red kidney beans, pinto beans or black beans), cooked lentils or even lightly sauteed mushrooms.
• If you find the flavor too creamy or want to try something new next time, add some spices! Old El Paso has great pre-mixes available and adding a couple of spoonfuls of taco seasoning, fajita chicken mix will give this white chicken enchilada a new spin!