Mom's Chicken Enchiladas

Chris loves Mexican food and I find this is an easy way to please and have left overs for lunch through the week! It's also a way for me to use left-overs from when I make roast chicken, which I did last night.

This is a slightly adapted version of my Mom's recipe, she usually uses green enchilada sauce and I like a mix. If you are some sort of alien and prefer red sauce feel free to do that. If you are using one kind of sauce just be sure to get a big can, nobody likes dry enchiladas.

Ingredients
1/2 onion
8-10 olives, sliced (optional)
1/2 roast chicken, meat shredded (you can also boil 2 chicken breasts if you prefer)
24+ small corn tortillas
1 small can green enchilada sauce
1 small can red enchilada sauce
butter/oil as needed
1/2-3/4 cup (or more if desired) cotija or queso fresco cheese. If you can't find either I recommend substituting a blend of jack and cheddar.

1. Chop onion and saute till glassy
2. Add shredded chicken and olives
3. Add equal parts red and green sauce till chicken is moist (god I hate that word) through
4. Spray 9x13" pan and pre-heat oven to 350 degrees
5. Pre-fry tortillas and then 2 by about 30% (think of a Venn Diagram, don't know what that is? Ask a 3rd grader)
6. Fill tortillas w/ 1/4-1/3 cup of chicken mixture. Roll, place in dish and repeat
7. Take cans of sauce and add water till full again, you are just replacing the sauce you added to the chicken and the extra water will help keep you enchiladas moist (ugh).
8. Pour sauce-water mixture over enchiladas, wiggle the pan to make sure the liquids get down into the nooks and crannies.
9. Sprinkle with cheese and additional sliced olives if desired
10. Bake for 30 minutes until cheese is melted and liquid is bubbly.

Sorry I forgot to take pictures!

Roast Salmon with Green Beans and Black Bean Cakes

The unanaimous decision on these was: Good but not great, but they could be great.

They need cilantro in the cake, and a little more heat. I used the bell/jalapeno combo rather than the poblano because there weren't any when I went grocery shopping and I didn't want to make a special trip. Maybe next time I will...

I was a little unsure about what creamy beans look like, but other than that this recipe is not super difficult but it is time consuming. Make sure you start these EARLY. Chris and I ended up giving up on night one and saving the pureed beans for the next day.

The only tricky thing about these is actually cooking them. If you've ever made fried mashed potato pancakes you know how tricky it is. It requires a lot of patience, needless to say Chris got a little frustrated. :p Make sure when you're cooking these you cook them on true medium and ROTATE them before you flip them to ensure they are cooked evenly. The only thing that holds this guys together is the crust that forms from frying so unless you want just a gooshy mess, take your time, rotate, flip, rotate and then finish them in the oven.

What I am really excited about for this recipe is making Huevos Rancheros without a tortilla. I think some eggs, shrimp cheese and salmon would be FANTASTIC on these with or without heat. If you try it let me know how it goes, I might do it this weekend. If you have any questions about roasting salmon or cooking green beans leave a comment.

Bottom line: 3.7 Stars with Potential for a solid 4.5

Beef, Black Bean and Corn Nacho Dip with Sour Cream and Guacamole

We had this for dinner last night, it's pretty good. Would be great to take to a party, since it is tasty and your chips stay nice and crisp. We didn't have chili powder, so we used some cayenne, we also subbed canned corn for the frozen corn. We also added a little cumin, which I think was a good addition. If you're into heat definitely add some jalapeno!

Update: we made this for our Harry Potter Movie Marathon and we did it in the slow cooker and it was fabulous. Sautee the onion and brown the meat first then just dump it and everything else into the crockpot and leave it on low for 3-4 hours. We poured it into a baking dish, covered it with cheese, sour cream and home made Guacamole.

Bottom Line: 4 Stars

Cod with Mango Salsa and Black Bean & Corn Tortilla Cakes

I love fish with fruit salsa. When I was little I didn't like mangos, I think they just got lumped in with Papaya as some disgusting tropical fruit. I still think papaya is gross and smells like vomit and butt, however I have very seriously changed my mind about mangoes. 

I thought the mango salsa could have been more mango-y, maybe next time I'll chop it a little finer so that it distributes more evenly. In addition I added 1 tbs of minced jalapeno to the salsa. My biggest issue was that I really wanted a firmer fish, like halibut rather than cod, but cod is so much cheaper it was hard to justify to myself, or Chris, spending 4x as much money on the Halibut. Swordfish or Mahi Mahi would make this dish AMAZING.

The corn cakes were awesome, and really easy to make. I shortened them down to 2 layers (3 tortillas) rather than 3 layers because that seemed ridiculous given the height of the things as it was, and I also didn't have quite enough tortillas to make it that way. There was a TON of cheese in these, so if you are dieting I would suggest cutting the amount of cheese down to 1 cup of each, it would probably still be plenty.This would be an awesome meal to cook for a gluten free family member or friend!

UPDATE: I made this with prawns and thought it was better than cod, but I still think a good firm fish would be preferable.

Bottom Line: 4.6 Stars (I'll probably up it to a 5 when I figure out the right fish!)