Quick & Easy Southwest Chicken Soup

Quick & Easy Southwest Chicken Soup

This was something I put together on the fly recently when it was real cold out and I didn't want to really "cook" a meal. I used some things I had left over from other meals and made a small pot of soup! 

Breast meat from Rotisseri chicken, hand shredded

1 small onion - diced

2-3 cloves of garlic - diced

Handfull of shredded carrots

2 handfulls of frozen corn - mine is actually roasted corn found at Aldi

1 jalapeno - seeded and diced

1 can rotel

1 box light chicken broth or vegitable broth

1 can tomato paste - less is fine

Saute the onion and garlic until softened. Then add in the carrots, jalapeno and chicken. stir in the tomato paste, and then add remaining ingredients. bring to a boil. Then lower heat to simmer about 20 mins or until ready to eat. I might have seasoned it with some Mrs. Dash Chipotle Seasoning and probably sea salt and Black pepper!

I like to top mine with small handfull of crushed chips, cheese, sour cream and cilantro. You can do it however you want!

Venison Bolognese

Tonight I made THIS recipe and followed it to a T. I wasn't real impressed with the flavor, when the sauce was done so I ended up adding a little cumin. I'm pretty sure it was the coconut milk that threw me off. Anyway, hubby liked it and my friend Kendall enjoyed it. She even took some togo for lunch tomorrow.

My notes, if interested on what you might do differently:

1) The blogger used Coconut milk. I happen to have some in the fridge. I used it. I didn't like it. Next time I will use regular milk or heavy cream.

2) I think Mushrooms would go great in this dish, but then again I think Mushrooms go great in many dishes.

3) I might try to find an actual dry red wine to use instead of just buying the red cooking wine on the shelf next to the vinegars at Kroger.

4) Don't forget to refer back to my previous post about the Spaghetti Squash so you can enjoy some roasted seeds like I am right now!

Easy Meatballs and Marinara (Low Carb)

Meatballs & Marinara

7 Turkey meatballs, pre-made frozen. (If cooking one serving)

1 can diced tomato

1 can tomato sauce

1 T tomato paste

Italian seasonings - garlic, basil, salt, pepper... All to taste preference!

Combine all tomato products in pot, season and heat to a boil. Add frozen meatballs and simmer about 30 mins. 

Serve all 7 meatballs with 1 cup of sauce. Enjoy with a simple side salad for more veggies!

Note: the 7 meatballs with a cup of sauce was one serving for me, pre WLS. Now I could probably eat 3 maybe four meatballs depending on the size. 

Spaghetti Squash - done right!

Spaghetti squash:

Take one spaghetti squash, carefully cut it in half long ways. Dig out the seeds.

Pour some olive oil in the bowl shape and spread it all around. I used my hands. Sprinkle with salt, pepper, garlic, Italian seasoning... Whatever sounds good.

I put them skin side up on a rack that fits inside my cookie sheet. Bake at 350 for 20 mins. Turn them over and add a dollop (about 2 tbls) of real unsalted butter (in the bowl) and cover with foil. Bake for 30 more mins foil side up.

Remove from oven let cool a few mins while you prep some garlic bread and bake that... be careful, the butter is just sitting in a pool under that foil! 

Then, and this is the really exciting part, you get a fork and scrape the inside of the squash and watch the magic unfold! You'll probably need to empty the "spaghetti" into a bowl b/c there's SO much!! Scrape and scrape and scrape some more!!

Stir it up real good to even out the butter and seasonings. Toss in a little fresh Parmesan cheese and top it with your favorite meaty sauce! YUM-O!

again, no pics :( but here's another blog with a similar plan that also sounds yummy and has lots of fantastic pics! 

http://steamykitchen.com/11285-baked-spaghetti-squash-with-garlic-and-butter.html

DO NOT - and I'm serious! DO NOT THROW OUT YOUR SPAGHETTI SQUASH SEEDS!!! 

BONUS RECIPE!

Seperate the seeds from all the muck, rinse them really good and let them dry out on a towel. Overnight if you can wait that long. Me? no I'm not that patient. 

line the cookie sheet you used earlier with a sheet of foil. spread your clean and dry-ish seeds out on the foil. Spray with one of those low cal/no cal butter flavor sprays. sprinkle with seasoned salt. Then you bake them low (250) and slow (many hours) until they get a nice golden brown color to them. OR, if you are impatient like me, you can bake them for a little while and then turn on the broiler and and roast them quickly! be sure to give a few shakes to move them around. they will start to pop and that's when I know they are just about brown enough! 

I just LOVE these roasted seeds better than the store bought pumpkin seeds I tried to fill a craving with! yuck! the best part is that you control the flavor! I like a little season salt and a little darker brown. They taste like popcorn to me! and YES! you eat the whole seed, shell and all!

Green Chile Chicken Enchiladas

I'm Baaaaaaaaaack! 

Haven't blogged in quite some time. Lately, I've been thinking I should really start putting my recipes someplace where I can find them or easily send someone to them when asked. and  duh! why not blog them! Come to think of it I have put a few things here before!

Anyhoo... this recipe is for my deliscious Green Chile Chicken Enchilada's. It's a little different everytime. For example, I have made them all the same ingredients except I used ground Elk meat instead of Chicken. they were still very tasty! Also, fair warning about how I roll: You know how Rachael Ray used to work on 30 min meals? a little of this a little of that, no specific measurements? well if you can work with that then this will come easy, if you need exact measurements, good luck! and I probably won't go back and grammar check or spell check either so deal with the mistakes or go somewhere else! Lastly, some of the work I have done way in advance...

Sorry, I don't have any pictures to post of this one. I'll try to add some next go round!

My basic recipe is something like this:

1 Rotisseri Chicken -Skinned, Boned and and Shredded.
4-6 Hatch Chiles roasted, skinned, deseeded, diced. reserve half for sauce (this is that work done way in advance part)
1 onion, diced sauteed.
3ish garlic cloves finely diced sauteed with onions
1 bag shredded cheese - Quesadilla cheese (white) but any kind of creamy melty white cheese will do.
1-2 cans rotel 
cilantro 
cumin
salt/pepper

(optional ingredients: Drained/rinsed black beans, Mexi corn, Spinach, mushrooms, BACON!)

2 doz or more tortillas....

back to basics: The SAUCE!

1 jug heavy whipping cream (the mid size)
about 8 oz sour cream (half a container) light or fat free is fine, but at this point why bother!
half block cream cheese
half the Hatch chiles from above
butter, and flour for rue...
1 avocado
cilantro
salt/pepper
1 more bag of cheese (same as above)

Preparing the innards:

The Chiles. IF you have Hatch chiles, use them. fresh roasted are the best flavor! but if you don't you can use canned chiles. 1 can for the chicken mix, 1 can for the sauce mix (approx). I prepared my fresh hatch chiles when they came in season. roasted a bunch and canned them in 4 oz jars.

Chicken. If I've used a rotisseri chicken I shred it and put it through the food processor with the juices too and chop it into a fine mix. Doing it this way really keeps the moisture in the chicken and helps the entire recipe over all have a better taste and texture! (that, my friends is the big secret in this recipe)

place your finely diced chicken paste in a large mixing bowl and add to it the Chiles, onion, garlic, rotel and cheese. Season to taste with the cumin, salt, pepper and cilantro. Stir it all together until it's all evenly distributed.

Now... the easiest thing to do is roll the mixture into some softened FLOUR tortillas (taco size) and start lining them into a greased baking dish... if you choose to use corn tortillas there's a whole extra step. Corn tortillas should be slightly fried in a shallow bath of hot oil before rolling. This step helps to bind the corn tortilla so it doesn't crumble and crack when rolling. Pros: good corn tortilla enchilada's. Con: lots of extra work and grease... Everyone has preferred my flour tortilla enchiladas over the corn so I will be using flour.

Once you've gotten all your enchilada's rolled you make the sauce!

CREAMY Green Sauce!
Start with a rue: equal parts (two tbls) butter and flour in a pan it will clump and turn brownish. Start whisking into the rue the whole jug of whipping cream on a med/high heat. (about a pint, i think) whisk until the clumps are mostly gone from the rue and the cream starts to thicken some. Add to that the cream cheese in small clumps, sour cream, avacodo (also in small clumps) and the other half of your chiles. season with salt and pepper. Turn heat to low and simmer while whisking until it's mostly creamy. You may have a few small clumps of avacodo and the chiles of course but mostly it's real creamy. you can also get out your handy dandy hand blender if you have one - I do and it's fabulous! I use it almost daily for something!

Pour sauce and spread evenly of your enchiladas sprinkle with cheese and bake (at 350) until the cheese is all melty and maybe a little crusty! sprinkle a little cilantro on top for color and flavor... or leave it out. either way. All DONE!

Should yield at least 2 doz Enchilada's, probably more... (note: this batch made 3 doz)

Sorry if I'm all over the place! These were a HUGE hit last time I made them. Even my bro in law admitted they were great and he thinks he makes the best enchilada's! LOL! :)