Turkey Leg Enchilada Skillet
Shredded turkey, red chile sauce, and beans over torn tortillas in one pan.
- calories
- 620
- weight
- 11 oz
- cal / oz
- 56
- protein
- 38 g
- serves
- 6, scales
- prep
- 15 min
- cook
- 30 min
- total time
- 45 min
- water
- none
- cost
- $$
Calorie and protein figures are my own estimates, good enough for planning a food bag and not meant as precise nutrition data.
- Dinner
- Campfire coals
- Grill grate
- Dutch oven
- Car camping
- Basecamp
- One pot
- Pre-mix at home
- Needs a cooler
- Basic
Ingredients
| Cooked wild turkey leg and thigh meat, shredded | 3 cups | slow-cooked at home off the bone; canned chicken works if you have no bird |
|---|---|---|
| Red enchilada sauce | 1 28-oz can | |
| Roasted green chiles | 1 cup | canned, drained |
| Yellow onion, diced | 1 large | |
| Black beans | 1 can | drained and rinsed |
| Flour tortillas | 8 large | torn into strips |
| Shredded cheddar or Mexican blend | 2 cups | |
| Ground cumin | 2 tsp | |
| Salt and black pepper | to taste | |
| Oil | 1 tbsp |
Method
- Set a deep skillet or dutch oven on the grate over a bed of coals, not open flame. Add the oil and the onion. Cook until soft, about six minutes.
- Add the cumin and stir for thirty seconds, then pour in the enchilada sauce, the chiles, and the beans.
- Stir in the shredded turkey. Bring it to a low simmer and hold it there ten minutes so the meat takes on the sauce.
- Fold the torn tortillas in a handful at a time. They will soak up sauce and thicken the pan. Season with salt and pepper.
- Scatter the cheese over the top, cover with a lid or foil, and pull the pan to the edge of the coals. Five minutes, until the cheese melts.
- Spoon it out of the pan. Do not try to roll anything.
The original is a slow-cooker-and-oven build: roll everything into tortillas, bake, serve. In camp you have neither the eight hours nor the oven, so the work splits. The legs and thighs get slow-cooked at home, pulled off the bone, and frozen flat. Everything after that is a thirty-minute skillet job over coals.
Rolled enchiladas are a bad use of camp time and worse to clean up. Tearing the tortillas and folding them into the sauce gets you the same thing — soft tortilla, chile, meat, melted cheese — in one pan. The torn strips also thicken the sauce, which matters because a can of enchilada sauce is thin and would otherwise run off the plate. Wild turkey leg is dark, sinewy meat that needs long, wet heat; if you skip the home cook step and try to do it at camp, it will be tough.
Packing
Shred the turkey at home and freeze it flat in a zip bag. It thaws in the cooler over a day and doubles as an ice block. Cans, tortillas, and spices ride in the food bin.
Variations
- No wild turkey: two cans of chicken or a pound of leftover roast meat covers it.
- Corn tortillas in place of flour hold their shape better in the pan.
- A can of hominy or corn stretches it to eight servings.
https://realtree.com/timber-2-table-wild-game-recipes/wild-turkey-leg-enchiladas-recipe