La Casita Mexicana chefs host a monthlong enchilada festival in July

If the whole enchilada isn’t enough, get 14. That’s the number of enchilada varieties that will be stuffed, rolled and sauced every day throughout July at La Casita Mexicana in Bell (No. 34 on Jonathan Gold’s 101 Best Restaurants list) and Mexicano in Crenshaw. With owner-chefs Ramiro Arvizu and Jaime Martin del Campo in charge, the restaurants are staging their first enchilada festival.

Why 14 enchiladas? “It’s not a big number and not a small number,” Arvizu said. Each restaurant will have five that are the same, but the rest will be different. And the chefs will come up with specials in addition to the official menu.

The tortillas will be freshly made, some colored red with ancho and guajillo chiles and others green with poblano chiles.

Highlights include Veracruz enchiladas, modeled on pescado a la veracruzana. They’re filled with white fish and covered with tomato sauce, capers and sliced green olives. For San Luis Potosí-style enchiladas, potatoes and chorizo are wrapped in red tortillas and topped with cotija cheese and Mexican crema.

The restaurants will prepare the famous enchiladas placeras from the plazas of Morelia, Michoacán. The tortillas are dipped in red sauce and filled with cotija cheese and onions. On the side are diced potatoes and carrots and a piece of chicken.

Enchiladas based on Puebla’s chiles en nogada are filled with ground meat, dried fruit and nuts. They’re smothered with pecan cream sauce and sprinkled with pomegranate seeds. Then there’s the Oaxacan mole negro enchiladas; enchiladas suizas with chicken and tomatillo-cream sauce; enfrijoladas, with a pale sauce made from peruano beans, and tomato-sauced entomatadas.

Vegetarians can choose cheese instead of chicken as a filling, or try enchiladas poblanas with corn and poblano chile strips and a poblano cream sauce flavored with epazote.

The festival may be the start of something big — the chefs say perhaps not the enchilada equivalent of Tacolandia, but a smaller event. They’ve been working on it for six months. “The enchilada is a traditional dish,” Arvizu said. “We wanted to pay tribute to it.“

La Casita Mexicana, 4030 E. Gage Ave., Bell. (323) 773-1898 | Mexicano, 3650 W. Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd., Los Angeles, in Baldwin Hills Crenshaw Plaza (323) 296-0798.

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