Chicken Enchiladas

Hello all, today I am going to share one of my favorite recipes, Chicken Enchiladas. I found this recipe about ten years ago in a Better Homes and Gardens cookbook. It does take a little bit of time to make, but trust me it is well worth it. For this you will need:
8 Tortillas six inch flour or corn
1/2 cup Chopped onion
4 cloves Garlic, minced
1 teaspoon Ground coriander
1/4 teaspoon Pepper
2 tablespoons Margarine or butter
3 tablespoons All-purpose flour
1 8-ounce Carton dairy sour cream
2 cups Chicken broth
1 Or 2 canned jalapeno chili peppers, rinsed, seeded, and
Chopped; or one 4-ounce can diced
Green chili peppers, drained
1 cup Shredded Monterey Jack
Cheese
2 cups Chopped cooked chicken
Sliced pitted ripe olives (optional)
Chopped tomatoes (optional)
Sliced green onions
I usually double the recipe just because of the size of our family.
First thing you need to do is cut your chicken and cook that through, a couple of ways you can do this, i like to use skinless boneless breasts and cook in a little olive oil til the pieces are no longer pink in the middle. Another way I have done it when money is an issue, and honestly when is it not is to buy a package of chicken legs and they are usually about half the price of breasts. Then boil the legs with some spices to get a little flavor, then pick the meat off the bone to make shredded chicken. After the chicken is cooked you can follow the rest of the recipe.

Wrap tortillas in foil. Heat in a 350° oven for 10 to 15 minutes or till softened.

For sauce, in a saucepan cook onion, garlic, coriander, and pepper in margarine or butter till onion is tender. Stir flour into sour cream; add to onion mixture. Stir in broth and chili peppers all at once. Cook and stir till thickened and bubbly Remove from heat; stir in 1/2 cup of the cheese.

For filling, stir 1/2 cup of the sauce into chicken. Place about 1/4 cup filling atop each tortilla; roll up. Arrange rolls, seam side down, in a lightly greased 12x71/2x2-inch baking dish. Top with remaining sauce. Bake, covered, in a 350° oven about 35 minutes or till heated through.

Sprinkle with remaining cheese. Bake, uncovered, about 5 minutes more or till cheese melts. If desired, sprinkle with olives, tomatoes, and green onions. Let stand 10 minutes. Makes 4 servings.

Another way to do this if you don't want to roll the tortillas is to make it like a lasagna style, put a layer of tortillas on the bottom of the pan then a layer of the chicken mixture and repeat until the pan is full.
Well once again I am out of words, but I will continue to try new recipes and post the results, until next time.

Mmmmm... Dessert

So in my never ending quest to find the best tasting food, I didn't think that I could out do a Twinkie, but like my supervisor tells me at work... there is always room for improvement. Just a little history, the Twinkie was invented around 1930 by a genius named James A. Dewar in Schiller Park, Ill. He realized that machines made that were making cream filled strawberry shortcakes did nothing while strawberries were out of season, so he came up with snack cake filled with banana cream. During World War 2 bananas were rationed and the Hostess company was forced to switch to vanilla cream, some say a switch so popular they never went back. I say a concession the people of that era made and tragedy that we have to live with. So imagine my surprise when I found out that a few blocks from my new workplace is a bread store that sells banana cream Twinkies, and not only that, they sell them for around 75 cents for a box of 10, that is 7.5 pennies a piece. As the great 70's actor John Travolta once said "Oh My God".

So Scott and I leave for work about 10 minutes early, and take the detour to the bread store, I am not going to lie, we were a little giddy on this particular day, not much could take the smile off of our faces. As we walk into the tiny store our heads were on a swivel, where were they, they had to be near, then we saw them. Oh My God Banana Cream Twinkies at our 10 o'clock, we each grabbed two boxes and proceeded to the check out. Much like the fast bastard I am as soon as I got out to the car I opened the box and ate one, why oh why Hostess, why do you make them so tasty. Then I said something so profound, so mind bending, yet so simple..."oh if only I could dip this in chocolate." Then the wheels started turning. Hmmmm I know there is that product out there that makes a chocolate shell on your Ice Cream.
I took the Twinkies and skewered them so I could roll them in the Magic Shell, then put them in the freezer for about an hour just to get the out side cold so the shell would harden quicker. Then I poured a bottle of Magic Shell on to a plate and rolled the Twinkies in it. Back to the freezer for about 2 minutes and I had done it, Chocolate Covered Banana Cream Twinkies. No w during the writing of this post I did a little research, and I know there are Choco-Diles but its just not the same. Well off to the grocery store to get stuff for dinner tonight.

Tasty Cheese Steaks

Good morning everyone, thought I would do a quick post before I head out to work. The other night we wanted steaks, but not the same old steaks. I decided to try a recreation of a steak I had at Olive Garden. For this I took a regular round steak and marked it on the stove top grill.
After that I placed them in a cake pan and let them cook for about 10 minutes at 350 degrees. Then I pulled them out and put a slice of fresh mozzarella cheese on top. I have said it before when it comes to mozzarella cheese I like the soft fresh stuff, not the shredded stuff. We found a tub of fresh cheese at Fred Meyer that was already cut into perfect size rounds. then after the cheese was on top I put a little bit of Italian Style Bread Crumbs in top. I returned them to the oven to brown the bread crumbs and melt the cheese just a bit.
It was close to how the Olive Garden steak, but they had larger style bread crumbs with a little more spice in them, I think for next time I will pick up some Panko Bread Crumbs and add my own seasonings to get a better topping. The side dish on the first picture Tanya made, they are a mix of purple potatoes and yellow fingerling potatoes that she diced and sprinkled Lipton onion soup mix on, the she roasted them in the oven til they were fork tender. Then to finish them off she put a little garlic salt over the top. Well that's about all the time I have, I am leaving for work a few minutes early today, Scott and I have an idea for a great dessert and I need to stop by a store to pick up a few supplies.

Hey I Can Do That

Hello all, after a trip to Mongolian Bar-B-Que a few weeks ago, I remembered how fun it is and how much the kids enjoy getting involved in making their dinner. But then it came time to pay the bill...2 adults and 5 children comes to just over 50 dollars plus the tip!!! So I decided that I could that for a lot less. I was just going to make it one night, but I ran into a very good friend of mine Jeremi at Cost Plus World Market and he asked me about the blog and why I don't write too much any more, I just gave him the I am too busy speech. As I walked around the store I started to get excited about writing again because of all the cool dishes and cook wear they have. I purchased a wok and the cool bowl pictured above, then I went to the food section and I found the Asian isle, in there I found chow mien noodles and some sauces (all made in USA, I really want to find true Asian food).When Tanya got home from work, I asked the kids what veggies they wanted in their stir fry. We ended up choosing onion, broccoli, snow peas, carrots, and bell peppers. Tanya and I ran to the grocery store and picked up the veggies and also grabbed some petite sirloin steaks. When I got home I prepared the noodles per the instructions on the bag, pretty simple, boil water, add noodles, when noodles start to boil over add 1 cup of cold water, when noodles start to boil over again strain and rinse with cold water. While that was going on I took the steaks and cut them into about quarter inch slices.I was just going to start making stir fry, but I remembered the kids want to help out so I set up a makeshift Mongolian BBQ bar in the kitchen.
Not a great picture I know, but its all the veggies and a big bowl of noodles on the end. To make the stir fry I started the wok on medium high heat with olive oil, added the stir fry sauce and some soy sauce, I put the meat in first to make sure i got it cooked all the way through, then threw in the kids choice of veggies and noodles, I also added a splash of water to kind of steam the veggies. It only takes a few minutes per kid and they had fun, so I thought about it and lets do some math.
Wok 14.95
Sauces 15.00
Veggies 8.00
Steak 10.00
Noodles 1.49x2
Total 50.93 plus the tip, awe man. Just kidding the wok and the sauces can be reused I know so don't freak out, next time I can feed the entire family for around 20 bucks.Oh if you are wondering the bowl cost me 4 bucks and holds about 1 package off ramen noodles. I thought it was pretty cool and could not resist. Any way Jeremi this ones for you.

New Toys and Tri-Tip

My last day off for a week so I decided that I would spend the night in the kitchen. We picked up a couple Tri-Tips from Costco, and I picked up a dozen Scallops so it was kind of a Surf and Turf for me. For the Tri-Tip I used KC Masterpieces Steakhouse Marinade and soaked the meat in it for about 4 hours.After the four hours, I out them in a glass baking dish in the oven for one hour at 350 degrees. Then I pan seared some scallops and put those on the plate with some mashed potatoes and drizzled a little brown gravy over it. I also found a new way of plating my mashed potatoes that looks a little more upscale. I put a couple scoops of potatoes in a zip lock bag and cut the corner of the bag off, this made a piping bag and you can squeeze out a nice looking design on the plate. And just for looks I cut some Grape Tomatoes and placed them on the plate to add some color.
Now on to the toys part of the night, my sister Christy sent me some cool kitchen gadgets from Alaska. The first one is called an Ulu. This is a traditional knife of the Inupiat tribe of Northern Alaska. It has a six inch curved blade and a four inch birch handle.
It came with a cutting board, the coolest part of the cutting board is one side has a bowl cut into it. You can use that to put fresh herbs in and chop them and mix them together at the same time. The company that makes these is Great Northern Products and their web site is Ulu.com. the second toy she sent is called the Alaskan Bear Claw pasta and salad server. These are pretty cool for looks, but kind of hard to use to serve with.
Bus I have not tried them on pasta yet so maybe they will be better for that. Well back to work again tomorrow, guess I should get some sleep.

Moosetard Salmon

Hello once again friends, tonight I am going to write about a dinner I made a few nights ago. I did a steamed Sockeye Salmon Fillet, which is something that we usually do for dinner, but this time instead of using a slice of lemon and some baby dill weed, I used a mustard that my sister sent to me from Alaska. The brand is Moosetard, and they offer a wide variety of flavorful gourmet mustards on their website www.moosetard.com. Christy wanted to get me some so she had me go to their site and pick two flavors, I chose Alaskan Wildfire and Dineega Dill.
They came in a nice little gift pack with an Alaskan Birchwood Spreader, which I thought was really cool. Reading on the site it said the dill flavor pairs well with salmon so I figured why not give it a try. I was interesting, the dill flavor was perfect and the mustard seeds was a taste that i would not have normally put with fish but I enjoyed it. I prepared it by spreading it over the fillets before I steamed them, then laying a small lemon slice over that.
I steamed that for about 15 minutes in my bamboo steamer, you will know when its ready when the salmon turns from red to pink. I also was in a sea food mood that night so i pan seared a few scallops seasoned with just a touch of salt, then drizzled with aged balsamic. The green beans were steamed then tossed with a pat of butter and some lemon pepper. Well that's about it for tonight, another package arrived from Alaska today and it has an Alaskan knife called an Ulu in it, I am going to do my best to learn to use it and not cut off a finger, I will post the results of that soon.

Homemade Chili...Sort Of

Good evening all, well today I spent my day off trying to figure out what to make for dinner tonight. After a few minutes going from cupboard to cupboard I decided that I would try to make some chili. Now I say home made.. sort of because I have found a chili kit at Walmart, now this only includes a spice package, salt, cayenne pepper and masa. The spice package is the reason I buy it, I cant figure out the blend to make my chili taste this good. I got to use my new food processor for this recipe so I am double excited. For this recipe i used:
2 pounds of Ground Beef
1 package Bacon
2 White Onions
2 Cloves Garlic
1/8 Cup Oregano
1/8 Cup Basil
Pinch of Rubbed Sage
1 Box Carrol Shelby's Chili Kit
6 8oz cans of Chili Beans
2 8oz cans of Tomato Sauce
8 oz of Water
I start this off with putting the bacon in a food processor and chopping it up. Then put the beef and bacon in a pan to brown. Next I put the Garlic and Onions in the food pro and mince them. Add the onions and garlic to the browning meat and then mix in the oregano, basil and sage. Then in the crock pot mix the tomato sauce and water with the chili mix, i only use half of the cayenne pepper. Next I put the beans in and let those just sit together while the meat browns.
Then when the meat mixture is done I add it to the crock pot. Let that sit on low for about 4 to six hours and wallah... Dinner is served.
Off to the grocery store tomorrow, going to try the gourmet mustard my sister sent me, it says it pairs well with salmon, so we will see.