Chicken and Black Bean Tacos

I almost considered putting "messy" somewhere in the title of this recipe but was a little worried it would scare people away from trying it. ;) They are messy but man are they worth it! These little tacos are deceptively simple and surprisingly delicious. I had tried experimenting with something else and when that didn't really work, I modified it for this recipe instead. So yummy!

Just a note: for this recipe, I used canned Parmesan cheese. Normally I believe in using only freshly grated Parmesan cheese. While that would work for this recipe, there is something about the canned variety that gives it a nice flavor.



Chicken and Black Bean Tacos
Recipe from Cucina di Harwood

2-3 chicken breasts
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
1 can black beans, drained
1 can diced tomatoes {the sweet onion variety is really yummy!}
1 tsp cumin
2 tsp Worcestershire sauce
Canned Parmesan cheese
Shredded cheese
Shredded lettuce
Corn tortillas

Directions:
Cook your chicken breasts, using the skillet method, in 2-3 cloves garlic. When cooked through, shred. Add the beans, tomatoes, cumin and Worcestershire sauce; cook for 5 minutes, uncovered. When ready to serve, sprinkle with canned, grated Parmesan cheese, per your preference. Serve on warmed corn tortillas with shredded cheese and lettuce. Fold in half and eat up!

Chicken Salad

I really love chicken salad. It is one of my favorite summer recipes. The combo of sauces, grapes and chicken is magical, I'm tellin' ya! This particular recipe is probably my favorite.

Chicken Salad
Recipe from Budget Bites

2 1/2 cups diced, cooked chicken meat, chilled or 2 12 oz cans of chicken
1 cup chopped celery (optional - I haven't ever used the celery - it's not my fav in this salad)

2 green onions finely diced, use the white and green parts

1 cup sliced, seedless grapes (or apples)
1/2 cup sliced almonds (optional)
2 tablespoons chopped fresh parsley or 2 tsp dried parsley
1 teaspoon salt
2/3 to 3/4 cup cup mayonnaise {note: original recipe calls for 1 cup of mayonnaise but it makes it much too heavy for my taste}
1/4 cup heavy whipping cream

Directions:
In a medium bowl, whip cream to soft peaks. Combine meat, celery, green onion, grapes/apples, almonds, parsley, salt, and mayonnaise with whipped cream. Chill and serve in Pita Pockets or on a croissant roll.

Even though this photo stinks, the salad is really yummy in these Pita Pockets.

Beef Steamer

I have no idea where I originally found the idea for this recipe. It's something that a lot of people probably figure has been around forever, I just hadn't made anything similar before this. Anyway, as I said, I don't remember where I found the original inspiration. But I took the idea and ran with it and this is what I came up with. 

This recipe is pretty much perfect for kids. I can't think of a kid I know who wouldn't like this stuff. It's a very simple, no-nonsense kind of recipe. Really, just meaning that it isn't complex with the flavors. The simplicity makes it a quick lunch or kid's meal, and since you put lots of veggies in it, I would feel okay feeding it to my daughter - at least, as soon as she is old enough to eat food like this, that is!.

Beef Steamer

Recipe from Cucina di Harwood

1 can chili

1 can tomoato soup

1/2 Tbsp. Chili powder

1 tsp garlic powder

1/3 tsp salt

1 lb. ground beef

1 cup dry macaroni or other pasta, cooked

1 onion, chopped

2-3 large carrots, grated

2-3 large florets of broccoli, chopped in small pieces {optional}

1/2-1 cup grated cheddar cheese

Directions:

Brown hamburger with onion; add green pepper just before the burger is completely cooked. If the hamburger is very greasy, add some flour to help soak up the grease. Add the rest of the ingredients and cook until warmed through.

If you would like the steamer a little more like soup, you could add some water. The macaroni and the cheese can be substituted for leftover macaroni and cheese.

Bean Chicken Wraps

This past weekend I saw my younger brother and he commented about this lil' ole cooking blog. It made me happy to know that someone out there actually looks at these recipes and enjoys them. He told me that he really likes my cooking site and thinks it's pretty good. However, he also said, "But you need more real food. You've got a lot of treats, but you need more main dishes, like Italian and meat dishes." I told him I'd work on that. :) So I came home and looked in my food photo folder and discovered that I've got lots of main dish recipes I haven't shared. So over the next couple of weeks I'll share a few that I've got saved up. Of course, they don't all fall under the meat or Italian categories, but they are main dishes! ;)

This recipe was inspired by one of those e-mail recipe exchange things. I'm sure most people have had them. But you know, they don't usually turn out as they should in theory. I'm lucky if I get one recipe back. Sad, sad. Anyway, I participated in one once and I got a recipe back that inspired this one. It is really yummy and so easy to put together. I think it's a perfect lunch recipe.

Bean Chicken Wraps

Recipe from Cucina di Harwood

Servings: 6-8

Prep time: 10 minutes -- Cooke time: 15 minutes

1 large chicken breast, cooked in garlic and cut into bite size cubes

1 12 oz or so can white beans, mostly drained {any kind of white bean works well}

1/2 yellow or green pepper, chopped

1/2 cup green onion, chopped - use green and white parts of the onion

1 tsp Italian seasoning

Salt and pepper to taste

1-2 Tbsp lemon juice

1/2 cup shredded 

1 cup cooked rice

Tortillas

Directions:

Mix together the beans and chicken. Put into an oven safe casserole dish. Top with onions, peppers, seasonings and juice and lightly fold into the beans mixture. Top with shredded cheese and bake at 350 for 15 minutes or until cheese is melted and bubbly. 

Warm tortillas in microwave for a few seconds so they are pliable and soft.

Top tortilla with a scoop of rice and bean chicken mixture. For some extra flavor, squeeze a bit more lemon juice on top. Wrap up and eat up! 

Variation:

You can use a 12 oz can of chicken instead of cooking your own chicken breast.

You can also cook this up in the microwave if you didn't want to fire up your oven.

Doritos Casserole

Need an easy, inexpensive weeknight meal? Don't really feel like cooking but you want something yummy that your family will eat? Want something your kids will eat? Then this is the recipe for you. My sister learned this recipe from somebody, I don't remember who, but she used to convince my mom to let us have it all the time growing up. And my hubby and I ate it a lot when we were college students. Hello cheap casserole! We would cut the recipe in half and bake it in an 8x8 pan and still always get at least two meals out of it, maybe more if we were sure to eat other stuff along with it. Now, it's more of a comfort food - kind of like macaroni and cheese - and is definitely the meal I turn to when I don't feel like spending a lot of time in the kitchen.

Doritos Casserole

Ingredients:

1 pkg. Cooler Ranch Doritos chips

2 cans chili

2 can cream of mushroom soup

Shredded cheese

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 F. Crush Doritos chips into bottom on 13x9-inch baking dish. Mix chili and cream of mushroom soup together; pour over Doritos. Cover with cheese. Bake until cheese is melted and inside is warm, approximately 15-20 minutes.

Note: The leftovers of this casserole really aren't that great because the chips get soggy if they sit for very long. If you want to make this up but plan to have leftovers, combine the chili and mushroom soup and put into a casserole dish. Cover with cheese and bake until warm and the cheese is melted and bubbly. Then put a single serving of crushed Doritos chips on a plate and cover with the chili mixture. This way you can add fresh Doritos chips to every serving and don't have to worry about  soggy chips.

DK Wraps

My brother-in-law came up with this recipe while he was on his mission in the South. He needed recipes that were easy and relatively inexpensive. These fit the bill pretty well. He and my sister made them for us when we were down visiting for Christmas. For being so simple, they are deceptively delicious. Actually, I'm kind of craving one right now. 

I also love the versatility. There are so many different ways you could cook them up, they could pretty much fit any taste.

DK Wraps

Recipe from Dakotah Gordon

Ingredients:

Flour or whole wheat tortilla wraps

Ground beef, cooked

Creole Seasoning

Bacon, cooked and chopped

Cheese, shredded

Directions:

Spread ground beef onto bottom half of tortilla wrap. Sprinkle desired amount of Creole seasoning onto meat - the more seasoning you use, the spicier it will be. Add some bacon and shredded cheese to the top. Fold the tortilla so that there are no open ends; grill on a George Foreman, in a saucepan, or on a barbecue grill. Serve it up! Mmm!

Variations:

Cooked, shredded chicken

Cajun or Italian seasonings

Add some BBQ sauce or ranch dressing

Use grilled fish, chopped shrimp or crab for the meat

Swiss cheese instead of cheddar

Perfect Mashed Potatoes

I really love good mashed potatoes. But I really hate not-so-good mashed potatoes. I personally love creamy, whipped, homemade mashed potatoes. One thing I hate: lumps in my mashed potatoes. If your definition of good potatoes doesn’t fit into that description, perhaps you should stop reading this post! 

Perfect Mashed Potatoes

Time: 1 hour

Makes: 4-6 servings

Ingredients:

2 large potatoes

1/8-1/4 cup milk, cream or half-and-half {using cream or half-and-half will give you thicker, slightly more flavorful potatoes} 

1/4 cup sour cream

2 Tbsp. butter

1/2 tsp. salt

Directions:

First you must boil the potatoes. Scrub or peel them {I like some peel on my potatoes but it’s whatever you like} and cut them into small cubes. The smaller your cubes, the faster your potatoes will cook. Put the potatoes in a sauce pan and cover with an inch of water. Bring to a boil and cook for 30-40 minutes or until a fork inserted into a potato goes through easily. You want ‘em nice and soft. Drain the water off {you can save the water if you like to make pancakes or something with the potato water}. 

Mash the potatoes using some kind of masher. Mash ‘em up about as good as you can with that. 

Yes, I am aware that my "masher" isn't really a potato masher. Actually, to be honest, I don't know what it is really for.

Add the milk, sour cream, butter and salt and stir it around until well incorporated and the butter is melted. 

Use less milk if you prefer a stickier, stiffer mashed potato and more milk if you like them thinner.

Now use a hand mixer and whip the potatoes up for 3-4 minutes or until they are nice and fluffy. 

Voila! Perfect, non-lumpy mashed potatoes!

Hot Hoagies

When I was pregnant, I had a hard time with sandwiches. I'm not a big fan of peanut butter {and it was even more unbearable when I was pregnant} so I usually eat meat sandwiches for lunches. But when you're pregnant you're supposed to stay away from deli meats. Unless you heat them up. But then you have a funny tasting sandwich - hot meat, cool mayo and mustard and pickles and tomato . . . too weird. So I just didn't really eat many sandwiches. And I was sad about that. Because I actually do love a good meat sandwich. Mmm. Anyway, then this recipe fairly fell in my lap and I was a happy camper once again. At least, this was the closest I was going to get to a meat sandwich that wasn't weird for a while.
And you know what? It isn't weird.
It's so tasty that I still keep making it even though I can eat meat sandwiches again.

Now that's saying somethin'.

Hot Hoagies
Recipe from Mel's Kitchen Cafe

1 loaf french bread, cut lengthwise

2 cups cooked, shredded chicken (in a pinch, you can use two large cans chicken breast)

1/2 cup light mayo

1/2 cup reduced fat sour cream

2 green onions, thinly sliced (white and green parts)

1/2 teaspoon garlic salt

1/3 cup fresh parsley, chopped (or 2 tablespoons dried)

2 cups shredded cheese

Olives, chopped (0ptional)

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Place french bread on large baking sheet. Mix all topping ingredients together in a bowl. Spread topping evenly on top of both lengths of french bread. Bake for 15-20 minutes until bubbly and edges are lightly browned. Slice into pieces and serve immediately. Mmm, mmm, tasty!

Macaroni and Cheese _ 1

This is pretty good macaroni cheese recipe, though I'm still in search of that perfect recipe. We like our macaroni and cheese to be cheesy and creamy, but I'm not a fan of Velveeta {or some other such processed cheese}, which seems to be the best way to get really creamy macaroni and cheese. This recipe really is pretty good, though I don't recommend using the onions and it really should be served right away as that is when it tastes the very best. It is really quite creamy & delicious though the cheese flavor isn't the strongest - but if you want a fairly quick, creamy homemade macaroni and cheese dish, this is it.

Macaroni and Cheese _ 1
Recipe inspiration & some directions/measurements came from Family Dinners by Janet Peterson.

2 Tbsp. butter or margarine
2 Tbsp. flour
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. pepper
2 cups milk
2-3 cups grated cheddar cheese {can use another variety if desired}
1 package pasta {I probably used around 9-10 ounces; I just cooked up a bunch of pasta and added until I felt there was a good ratio and used the leftover pasta with spaghetti sauce}
1/4-1/2 cup chopped onion or 1 1/2 Tbsp. dried minced onion {optional; we used this and didn't really like the flavor it added so we probably won't do it again}
1/2-3/4 cup sour cream

Directions:
Melt butter in a large saucepan {saute your onion at this point if you are going to use it}. Stir in flour, salt and pepper and cook for about 1 minute {it's best if you have all these ingredients measured out and ready - once you put the flour in the cooking goes quickly and you'll want to stir the flour frequently so it doesn't burn}. Add milk; cook and stir over medium heat until slightly thickened {add up to 1 Tbsp more flour if the milk isn't thickening enough & be sure to stir frequently or the milk will burn on the bottom of the pan}. Add cheese and sour cream stirring until melted. Stir in the pasta. Serve immediately.

Variation:
Transfer the pasta/sauce mixture to a baking dish and sprinkle with bread crumbs. Bake, uncovered, at 350 degrees F for 25-30 minutes or until slightly browned and bubbly. {I recommend using slightly less pasta so there will appear to be excess sauce - if you don't do this your macaroni will end up being kind of dry and it won't be creamy anymore.}

Optional Ingredients:
1 tsp. dry mustard or 1-2 tsp Dijon mustard
1 package {8 oz} cream cheese
1/2 cup cottage cheese
1/3 cup fine bread crumbs

Crescent Sandwiches

This is a recipe I “made up” one day for lunch. I get really bored of sandwiches for lunch so I like trying to come up with new things I can do. The day I made these I had some crescent rolls in the refrigerator that I needed to use so I came up with this. Really, it wasn’t hard. It’s not like I’m an amazing chef or anything. These are actually really simple but we really enjoyed them.

Crescent Sandwiches

Ingredients:

1 tube (8oz) refrigerated crescent rolls {or your own homemade equivalent}
8 slices of sandwich meat or some other pre-cooked variety of meat {I won’t tell you what brand or kind to use – that would be silly; choose something you like}
Mozzarella cheese, cut into small slices
Ranch dressing


Directions:
Open the tube of crescent rolls and unroll them onto an un-greased baking sheet.

Take a slice of sandwich meat, fold it into a triangle and place it on widest end of the crescent roll.

Then add the slices of mozzarella cheese {I cut mine nice and small so they'd fit really well} and roll, starting at the widest end.

Continue with the rest of the sandwiches.

Bake at 350 degrees for 5-6 minutes or until golden brown. Serve with ranch dressing and vegetables.