San Antonio School Lunchroom Cheese Enchiladas

In the 1950’s, San Antonio school districts set Wednesday as Enchilada day at all of their schools. It was so wildly popular, many surrounding cities (Austin included) followed suit and made Wednesday “Enchilada Day” at most of the school cafeterias. I moved to Austin from Dallas my Junior year in high school. Dallas did not and probably still does not participate in this glorious cultural icon on a styrofoam plate. I could not figure out what all the chatter about “Vera’s Enchiladas”  on Wednesday was all about. I got with the program really quickly. We still call them Vera’s Enchiladas to this day when comparing fancy plates of enchiladas at overpriced TexMex places. “Not as good as Vera’s” is pretty standard table conversation when we are comparing- and it’s been 35 years (good god that’s hard to fathom) since I have had Vera’s haha.

Janell grew up eating them, I started in High school, both my kids ate them every Wednesday from kindergarten through senior year. Attendance data shows that Wednesday is the day with highest attendance in every school that serves them and it’s also the day that is most visited by parents to eat lunch with their kids. It’s kind of a big deal.  

This week I saw that one if the school districts in San Antonio released their recipe and someone made a YouTube video of it. We knew we had to make it as soon as we saw it. We fancied it up a bit with wagyu beef, homemade everything (except tortillas in this case- we went off the shelf which is the standard). 

They were fantastic. As good as I remember and a super fun way to reconnect to a great high school memory. 

In a TexMex place, 2 enchiladas, rice, and beans is the first thing listed under Mexican plates. You can make it “Deluxe” by adding a crispy beef taco and a guacamole salad. The only level above this is adding a queso chip, which is a taco shell broken in half and smothered with queso. Our
local plate calls this version “Ganzo’s Plate” but there are many names for it. Mostly “Mexican Dinner #2 or #3 if they have a few step ups. Either way, it is the iconic TexMex plate at every restaurant down this way. 

Here is our entry into the Mexican Dinner #2 sweepstakes. 2 cheese enchiladas, rice, beans, crispy beef taco, guacamole salad with paprika red wine vinaigrette. Pictured with the 1st salsa I posted (The gold standard table salsa at all the restaurants down here) in the salsa vault thread on the crispy taco. 

I need a nap.