Mexican Chicken Bake

I am totally stuck in a rut for dinner ideas.  Or at least I was until I remembered this recipe I had bookmarked a week or so ago.  So glad I remembered!  This was probably one of the best meals I have made in a long time.
I took the original recipe from here…Dandy Dishes
Of course I had to change some stuff around and make it all mine right?


Mexican Chicken Bake Serves 4
Ingredients:
3 chicken breasts (follow the simple recipe below for Salsa Chicken)
1 can pinto beans (drained and rinsed)
1 ½ tablespoons cumin
1 ½ tablespoons chili powder, or more if you really like it spicy
1 tablespoon garlic powder
1 tablespoon cilantro, chopped
Juice of 1 lime
¼ cup sour cream
salt & pepper to taste
½ cup shredded cheddar cheese

Optional garnishes:
Shredded lettuce
Diced cherry tomatoes
Sliced avocado
Cilantro leaves
Sour cream

Diections:
Preheat your oven to 375º. In a large bowl place the shredded chicken, pinto beans, spices, lime juice, sour cream, cilantro and salt and pepper to taste then mix well. Transfer to a lightly oiled baking dish and top with cheese. Pop into the preheated oven for 15 minutes then garnish the top with shredded lettuce, diced tomatoes, avocado slices and serve with a nice dollop of sour cream and your favorite hot sauce.

Salsa Chicken
Ingredients:
I jar of good quality salsa (or just you favorite!)
chicken (4 breast or 8 thighs-boneless skinless)
Directions:
Throw chicken and salsa into a crockpot on low and cook for 4-8 hrs depending on whether or not you had the foresight to thaw your chicken (yes, I throw frozen chicken in here).
Once the chicken is done.  You need to remove it from the crockpot and the sauce and shred it.  This chicken can now be used in tacos, nachos, or anything else that requires some nicely seasoned chicken!

***We ended up using this dish in tacos, as nachos and just like the picture is!  They loved them!!!
***You could also use a rotisserie chicken and shred that in place of the salsa chicken!

Homemade (quick) Refried Beans

The other day I was making tacos for dinner when I realized that I had used up the last can of refried beans.  See, I really, really like beans and on my tacos they are one of my favorite things!  I was crushed…

I didn't have time to go to the grocery store so I jumped online to see how easy they would be to make them myself.  Guess what?  If you plan ahead you can make them real easy…only problem was I had not planned ahead and had about 10 minutes to figure this out!  I had no time to soak beans (even a quick soak would take too long).  So !reached for a can of pinto beans and went to work. 
This is one of my favorite ways to eat refried beans: Whole Wheat tortilla, refried beans, jalapenos, tomatoes and fresh cilantro!

Refried Beans

Ingredients:

1 can of pinto beans, rinsed and drained (I try to find the canned beans that have the fewest ingredients in them.  A lot of beans have added sugar???)
1/4 cup water
1/2 tsp granulated garlic
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp chili powder
1 small can of chopped green chilies

Directions:

• Drain and rinse pinto beans.
• Place in small saucepan over medium heat and add water.
• As the beans heat mash them with a potato masher or fork. 
• Add all spices and stir well
• Add green chilies and cook on low heat stirring frequently until they reach your desired consistency.

I really need to try this with pinto beans that have been soaked overnight but I just never seem to be able to plan that far ahead…hehehe!

****Did you know that a 1/4 cup serving of fat free refried beans only have 1/2 a WW Point????  That whole lunch above is only 1-1/2 WW Points!

Salsa Chicken Enchiladas

Quite possibly this is to be one of the laziest posts I’ve even written.  Why?  Because it is my lazy end of the week go to meal.  I got the recipe from my friend Lynn and have been making them regularly since!!!  This is a great recipe to use to feed a crowd and Lynn has used it to feed many over the years…

Salsa Chicken

Ingredients:

I jar of good quality salsa (or just you favorite!)
chicken (4 breast or 8 thighs-boneless skinless)

Directions:

Throw chicken and salsa into a crockpot on low and cook for 4-8 hrs depending on whether or not you had the foresight to thaw your chicken (yes, I throw frozen chicken in here).

Once the chicken is done.  You need to remove it from the crockpot and the sauce and shred it.  This chicken can now be used in tacos, nachos, or anything else that requires some nicely seasoned chicken!

We use it in enchiladas…

 

Salsa Chicken Enchiladas

Ingredients:

corn tortillas
salsa chicken (see recipe above)
shredded cheese
onions, finely diced
enchilada sauce
jalapenos, finely diced

Directions:

Heat oven to 350F.

Using Elise from Simply Recipe’s process of heating the tortillas - “Heat a small light skillet on med-high heat. Add a teaspoon of oil (high smoke point oil as indicated above, we use grapeseed oil) to coat the pan. Dip a tortilla in the sauce (I used the sauce from the crockpot that I cooked the chicken in) to coat the tortilla with sauce on both sides. Place the tortilla in the skillet and heat for a few seconds, until the tortilla begin to show some air bubbles. Use a metal spatula to flip to the other side for a few more seconds. Set aside on a plate. Repeat with remaining tortillas.”

Using these tortillas place some shredded cheese, onion and shredded chicken in them and roll.  Place seam side down in a baking pan large enough to hold the amount you are making.  When the pan is filled top with enchilada sauce, onions, cheese and jalapenos.

Pop these in the oven and bake for about 20 minutes or until nicely browned and the cheese is all bubbly.

As Always…

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

Black Bean and Goat Cheese Quesadillas

My goal each and every day is to feed my family a healthy lunch and dinner.  Oh how I have been lax at meeting that daily goal!  Turning a new page and starting off on the right foot and all here is my attempt to get it all back together.  The meals that I cook have to either be crock pot, slow cooked or else pre cooked that we can heat up after, between or before whatever extra curricular event we have happening on that night.  I don’t use packaged or prepared foods at all so everything that I do is from scratch, just to make it more challenging huh?

Between karate 2 days, skating 2 or 3 days and BMX 2 or 3 days you can just imagine that it is a little hectic around here.  One thing though that we ALWAYS make sure that we do it to eat together.  There is none of this grabbing and eating on your own here.  We sit down to a family meal each and every single night.  Is it easy?  No way, but we do it.

One of my big problems though is that we get pretty bored with all of the fast things that I can make and it has been way too hot for a slow cooked or crock pot meal.  So this is what I came up with yesterday and it is going to be added into the rotation.

Black Bean and Goat Cheese Quesadillas

I was able to make the black bean mixture, cut up all of the cilantro, jalapenos and crumble the goat cheese ahead of time.  When we got home I heated the bean mixture and got the griddle going.  These were assembled, cooked and on the table in 10 minutes.  I served sautéed zucchini along side and it was really the perfect meal!

Black Bean and Goat Cheese Quesadilla (inspired by Fine Cooking)

2 Tbs. olive oil
1 lg yellow onion, finely chopped
3 cloves of garlic, minced
24-oz. can black beans, rinsed and drained
2 tsp. ground cumin
1 Tbsp. chili powder
1/2 tsp oregano
Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro
1 jalapeno, chopped
4 oz. fresh goat cheese, crumbled
6 flour tortillas, Burrito size (we used 2 whole ones for T and I and 1 each for the girls)

In a medium skillet, heat the oil over medium heat until hot. Add the onion and garlic and sauté, stirring, until softened, about 5 minutes. Add the beans, cumin, chili powder, oregano and 1/2 cup water and cook, stirring occasionally, until almost all the water has evaporated, 5 to 7 minutes. Take the pan off the heat. With the back of a fork, break up the beans to make a chunky mash. Stir in half of the cilantro and season with salt and pepper.

Spread the black bean mixture over the tortilla and crumble the goat cheese, sprinkle with jalapeno and some cilantro top with another tortilla.  Cook on a heated and oiled griddle until nice and golden brown.  Repeat with the remaining ingredients and slice up and serve.

**We served these with chopped up avocado, salsa and sour cream.  This was a delicious and quick week night meal!

This would also be a great idea for an appetizer for your next party or pot luck.  Cut into smaller wedges these would be perfect!

As Always…

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

Grilled Tilapia Tacos with Pineapple Salsa

I was at a loss once again for dinner the other night, so I called upon my ever faithful twitter pals! I needed something fast and that could be prepped ahead and thrown together in about 5 minutes. I ended up with some really good suggestions – pasta with fresh tomato sauce, quesadillas, breakfast for dinner… All great suggestions but then Maria from Two Peas and Their Pod hit me with a wrap and my dinner evolved from there!

We ended up having grilled tilapia in a tortilla with fresh pineapple salsa and it was amazing but it would be excellent with chicken as well. It’s a very versatile salsa and one I will be making again and again!!!

Pineapple Salsa

Ingredients:

1 8 oz can of pineapple chunks in juice, cut up smaller
1/2 cup cilantro, chopped
1/4 cup onion, finely diced
1 jalapeno, seeds and membrane removed and finely chopped
1/4 cup red pepper, finely chopped
juice of 1/2 lime
1/2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp fresh ground black pepper

Directions:

Mix all ingredients together and allow to chill in the fridge for about 1 hr before serving.

As Always…

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

A little late for Cinco de Mayo but good anytime…

I hate when real life gets in the way of my food blog, but sadly it has. I had my youngest home with me and then I ended up sick. Not the really bad sick but enough to knock me on my keester for a day or so. Anyway this post is sadly long overdue but too good not to post!

Pastel Azteca

A couple of weeks ago I was searching for a recipe to take to our groups regular monthly pot luck. This months theme was Mexican, Spanish or Latino. Easy enough huh? I just didn’t want to do any of the common things like tacos or enchiladas. I was going to do tamales but that looks like a ton of work. I then remembered my friend Ben at What's Cooking giving me a lead on one of his favorite recipes!!! After looking it over I decided that this one would be perfect and was exactly what I was looking for!!!

Thanks Ben for a delicious recipe and one that was a real hit! The only thing I would do differently next time is to make more sauce. The sauce was delicious!!!

Chicken Pastel Azteca (from Ben @ What’s Cooking?)
8-10 servings

The ingredients:

• 1 chicken breast shredded (I used 2 cooked breasts)
• 1 lb tomatoes
• 1 medium size onion
• 3 garlic cloves peeled
• 1-2 chipotle adobado peppers
• 16 ounces tortilla chips, you can either make your own by cutting in quarters approximately 24 corn tortillas and frying them or baking them or buy them made at the store
• 3 cups chicken broth
• 8 oz. Chihuahua cheese shredded 2 cups approx. or shredded mozzarella cheese
• 1/2 red onion sliced
• Salt and pepper to taste

The how-to:

1. Blend together tomatoes, onion, garlic and adobado peppers using one cup of chicken broth. (I cooked the onions and the garlic first then blended this in my food processor)
2. Pour the sauce into a sauce pan and add the rest of the chicken broth. Bring to a boil, season to taste and reduce the heat to low. Simmer for about 15 minutes.
3. Preheat oven to 350° F.
4. Place a layer of tortilla chips at the bottom of a 9”x13” baking dish using 1/2 of the tortillas.
5. Add a second layer of shredded chicken, half of the shredded cheese and half of the red onion slices.
6. Pour some of the tomato sauce into the pan.
7. Add a final layer of tortilla chips and cheese and pour the rest of the sauce.
8. Bake for 20 minutes, let it rest for 10 minutes before serving and garnish with sour cream, red onion and chopped parsley.

Too late for Cinco de Mayo but still a really good meal. This would be a quick and easy week night meal and I can’t wait to make it again!!!

As Always…

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

Garbage Nachos

At least that’s what we call them. Sounds funny huh? We pretty much call fully loaded anything “garbage”. We have garbage pizza…when you put everything on it that you can think of that would go with your dough and then we have garbage nachos. These are the best!

To top these nachos I used:

Taco seasoned beef (I make my own-recipe here)
refried beans
sharp cheddar
fresh jalapenos
onions
black olives
sour cream
cilantro (added once cooked)

Directions:

• Heat the refried beans and make your taco meat.
• Start chopping your jalapenos, onions, black olives and cilantro. Also grate your cheese.
• Arrange the chips on parchment paper and preheat your oven to 400 degrees. On top of the chips layer the beans and taco meat. Add the cheese, jalapenos and olives.
• Bake until hot and bubbly.
• Top with cilantro and sour cream.

This is a delicious, casual weekend meal for us. Usually on Saturday when I don’t want to cook or clean up too much. It also works out well for us because everyone can have their favorite toppings on their own!

Please try making your own taco seasoning! Not only will you save money but there is less sodium and unpronounceable additives!

As Always…

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com

Stuffed Green Pepper's Our Way

Stuffed Green Pepper's Our Way

I have a lot of zucchini...I mean a whole lot of zucchini...I went to the Farmer's Market today at Cape Harbor. The same one that I went to last week and got a ton of peppers. This week he sold me a ton of zucchini. This is just too good to pass up. A whole case of the things, organic no less for $15!!! I guess we'll be eating a lot of zucchini in the next couple of weeks!

See...Lots and lots of zucchini!!!

Last nights dinner was pretty great. We held a bunch of the green peppers back from last weekend and decided that we would stuff them one night during the week. Well you all know how that goes. Time just gets away from you and before you know it the week is done and you still have the green peppers that need to be stuffed and eaten. By now you all know that one of my children is a true tomato hater. This is the only pass that either of them get. She has to eat everything else...try stuffing a pepper without using tomatoes!!! This what I came up with...

Stuffed Green Peppers Our Way

4 green peppers, halved lengthwise with seeds removed
1 lb sweet Italian sausage (we used Romano and Garlic)
1/2 onion chopped
4 cloves garlic (use more or less depending on your taste), chopped
2 Tbsp taco seasoning mix
1 tsp cumin
1 tsp paprika
1/4 tsp white pepper
1/2 tsp black pepper
1 tsp salt
1 can black beans, drained
2 cups of cooked bulgar
1/2 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
1 (12 oz) pkg of Queso Fresco (crumbling cheese not frying), crumbled
2 chopped tomatoes, seeds removed

Directions:

• Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
• Brown sausage and add garlic and onion and cook until tender. Mix in the seasonings. When well mixed add the can of beans and the cooked bulgar. Add the tomato last and cook until heated through.
• Place prepared peppers on a foil lined baking sheet and fill with about 1 Tbsp of the cheese. Top with enough of the bulgar mixture to fill the pepper. Top with more cheese.
• Bake in preheated oven for about 35 minutes. Brown the cheese under the broiler.
• Serve with a side of fresh pico de gallo
  

This was lunch yesterday! I make the BEST pico de gallo!!!

We removed enough of the stuffing mixture for one pepper before adding the tomato for my daughter to eat. This was a nice, quick, fresh tasting meal. The reason I used the bulgar was because it was faster cooking (about 15 minutes) than brown rice and more neutral flavored.

Now what to do with all of those zucchini??? Looks like zucchini fritters for tonight!!!

As Always...

Happy Entertaining!!!

Judy
www.nofearentertaining.com