Homemade taco seasoning is one of the hand blended spice mixes that I always have stocked for simple easy meals. With no crazy additives like MSG or anti-caking agents that are commonly found in packaged mixes, you can be sure you’re keeping your diet clean. …
Comfort foods have been in high demand at our house and these chipotle stuffed peppers have absolutely been in rotation a few times this past month. I’ve been exhausted balancing the kids school work with trying to maintain running our consulting business. Add in that …
Finally, I’m willing to admit that my garden is done for the season. I’ve harvested all it had to offer and preserved much of it for future meals. One of the vegetables that my garden provided in abundance this year was tomatillos. These plants seem to sprout EVERYWHERE so I just let them do their thing and was rewarded tenfold. Of course, I then had to come up with ways to use them. Salsa verde is a big one for me as I make it to sell at the local artisan market so I accomplished that task first. Wanting to do something different (and to stock my own shelves with home-canned soup for the winter), I landed upon making a large batch of chili verde. Authentically flavored, this chili verde is a south of the border stew prepared with fresh tomatillos, pork and green chilis for a mouth-watering medley.
Chili verde is also very versatile. I’ve made it a few times this season and discovered that it’s equally as awesome with potatoes or beans. I happened to have a lot of ground pork in the freezer so that is what this version calls for but it’s also fantastic using diced pork shoulder or even ground poultry. For a mild pop of spice, this stew uses jalepenos, anaheim or hatch chilis. If you want it warmer, you can use hotter green chilis as well like serranos.
Snow falling on my pine trees equates to cravings of all things warm, cozy and filled with goodness. The most recent cozy goodness came in the form of quinoa chili which is packed with a mix of black and pinto beans and veggies which was …
I admit I’ve been less than motivated these past few weeks. In part, I blame our out of character April weather patterns bringing a ridiculous dumping of snow upon my Minnesota backyard. The rest of my time has been spent preparing my seedlings in their …
One of my favorite things to order at Mexican restaurants are the chile rellenos which I always pair with an enchilada. I’m predictable that way. Intimidated by the thought of making these little beauties, I finally bit the bullet to discover my fear of them being difficult to make was unfounded. I assumed it would be a challenge to remove the skins from the peppers but let me assure you, it indeed is not. The skins are removed from the peppers by either roasting them over a gas burner until they char or by broiling them to get the same effect. Then, you let them cool and the skins literally just rub right off.
I also learned something else new about chile rellenos. Chile rellenos are dipped in beaten eggs and not a flour based batter. Who knew?!? This Minnesota girl surely didn’t so I was pleasantly surprised in doing my research to find that there is little to no flour used in chile rellenos. Occasionally, the pepper is dusted lightly in flour of some kind to help the egg whites stick but they don’t have to be. I chose to keep it flour free but if you have difficulty with the eggs sticking to the pepper, you can dust the outside of the pepper in any type of flour to help it stick.
For the sauce, I use a unique enchilada style sauce with a little squash in place of part of the tomatoes to enhance the nutritional value without affecting the flavor. The pureed squash also serves to make the sauce more smooth similar to the effect of using tomato paste. Feel free to use this easy enchilada sauce recipe instead. Stuffing the chile rellenos is not super challenging either. Just slit the top open wide enough to fit your knife or a spoon inside and scrape out the seeds and as much of the pith (the white membrane) as you can. Then stuff the inside with a melty Mexician cheese like queso quesadilla or monterey jack. You can also stuff it with shredded chicken or picadillo if you’d prefer!
Oh man, you guys are in for a treat! These may not be one-hundred percent authentic Mexican but dang are they good. You will NOT be disappointed. This recipe originally comes from my sister so I have to give her credit for the basic rub …
Gimme a huge scoop of this black bean and corn salsa and I’m instantly transported into a beach chair with my feet in the ocean fronting the Riviera Maya. So colorful, and SO extremely delicious, this black bean and corn salsa is the perfect compliment …
The last nine months (or more?) have been really taxing my creative brain. That’s not a bad thing, but my cooking mojo is on a much needed vacation after creating a minimum of three new recipes each week for months while working on a way cool project. As a result, my site has some much needed maintenance that needed attention so I’ve been spending time updating the static blog pages and improving the “Shop” pages to make it easier for all of you to find and shop the kitchen gadgets and ingredients I use on a regular basis. In the meantime, I’ve posted a bit less often and have really needed to fall back on easy no-brainer meals like these black bean avocado huevos rancheros.
Huevos rancheros is a Spanish word meaning “rancher’s eggs.” The base of this hearty breakfast (or lunch) is eggs, traditionally served over tortillas, refried beans, rice, avocado slices and a red sauce. I’ve eliminated the rice and corn tortillas in this recipe to be lower in carbs but feel free to toss them back in if you wish. I also swapped the refried beans for black beans alongside a chopped avocado and then smothered with easy enchilada sauce. Combining eggs, black beans and avocados is the perfect breakfast trifecta providing protein, fiber and healthy fats to keep you satisfied until lunch.
Soon, my friends, I’ll be all caught up and back to posting once a week with amazingly awesome recipes. Also, stay tuned for the big announcement on the project I’ve been working on in the next few weeks!
Apparently, enchilasagna is an actual word. Well, at least it is on the interwebs. It’s simply the combo of enchilada fixings layered in a pan just like a lasagna. That word seems strange so I’m sticking with easy and uncomplicated and just calling this an …
