Chili powder awakens the senses and releases endorphins

I have had this rotisserie chicken in my fridge for longer than I would've liked due to the teeth removal and not cooking.  I decided it was finally time to cook it and I've been wanting to make enchiladas for some time and thought they'd be a good cold day meal with the snow and all.  I've tried enchiladas twice in my life before last night and I will say...I didn't like them AT ALL.  I'm not sure why I thought making them would make them better but I figured that as long as I drenched them in cheese they had to be good right?  Since this was my first enchilada making experience, I wanted to make everything from scratch so I decided to make the sauce instead of buying it b/c maybe that's what I didn't like about it before.  Instead of Mexican rice, I decided to make Mexican quinoa just to add some healthy aspect to the meal.

So to start, I gathered ingredients which was so cheap since much of it was canned and I already had the chicken.  These ingredients included:

shredded chicken

garlic

onions

chili powder

tomato paste

green chilies

diced tomatoes

quinoa

chicken stock

cream cheese

sour cream

jalapeño

shredded cheese

salt

rotel

oregano

paprika

corn tortillas

The first thing I made was the sauce b/c it had to simmer for a bit to thicken and cook flavors together.  Plus, it didn't need to be hot to it was ok if it sat in a pot for a bit while making the other stuff.  This process was pretty easy.  To start, I heated some oil and butter in a pot until it melted together.  Then, I added some flour and stirred until smooth and blended together. The chili powder was then added.  I used a whole container of regular red chili powder and mixed that together just until mixed. 

I decided it would be faster to add all the other ingredients into a mixing cup together so I could just dump it all in at once so the chili powder mixture didn't burn and taste bitter.  So in this mixing cup went some chicken stock, tomato paste, cumin, and oregano.  I allowed it to come to a boil and then turned it on low and let it simmer for about 20 minutes or so.  I also added salt to taste.  I stirred it occasionally to make sure the bottom didn't burn.  Once it was done, I turned off the heat and just let it sit while making chicken filling.

For the chicken filling, I started with heating olive oil in a pan.  I added chopped onions and jalapeño and let it cook just to release some of the heat.  Then, I added the green chilies and chicken with a little bit of chicken stock and let it cook a bit to dampen.

 Once that mixture was a little warm, I added cream cheese, sour cream, cumin, paprika, and salt and let it heat up until the cream cheese and sour cream melted and mixed the chicken mixture.  Once everything was heated through, I turned the heat off and started making the enchiladas.

I had some issues making the enchiladas at first.  I used corn tortillas and every time I would wrap the chicken, it would break.  This was incredibly frustrating for a bit until I decided to fry the tortillas first for about a minute.  This helped so much and we were well on our way to making enchiladas.  I didn't get a picture of the actual forming process but basically put a tortilla in the pan with a little oil and let it cook for a bit on each side.  Then, spooned about 2-3 spoonfuls of the chicken mixture into the tortilla and rolled up it.  Then placed them in a baking dish until all the chicken mixture was gone.  We eventually made an assembly line where Eric fried the tortillas and I filled and rolled.

After all the tortillas were rolled, I poured the sauce on top and covered the entire thing with cheesy goodness.  The dish went into the oven for about 30 minutes.

While the enchiladas were baking, we started on the quinoa.  Eric decided he wanted to help b/c I didn't feel like mincing garlic or cutting onions so he did that for me :)  So he minced the garlic and chopped onions that went with the already chopped green chilies that I didn't use in the chicken mixture.

Some oil was heated in a pan and the onions and garlic were added to cook for about a minute.  The rest of the ingredients were added and allowed to come to a boil (diced tomatoes, rotel, quinoa, chicken stock, cumin, salt).  The heat was then turned down to medium low and allowed to simmer until the liquid cooked out and the quinoa was done.    

 

The enchiladas came out of the oven about 10 minutes before the quinoa was done which I think was a good thing b/c it allowed it to cool and we didn't burn our mouths digging into it while the cheese was still bubbling.

It was finally time to eat!  After being a little frustrated with the tortilla rolling process, everything came out delicious and was a success.

It's not the prettiest dish but it was really good! I was really hoping there would have been a way to see the layers of the tortilla, filling, sauce, cheese mixture but the sauce and cheese just kind of fell over everything and then it just became a mess of delicious goo.  The sauce got even better after baking.  The flavors developed more and the sweetness of the tomatoes were brought out along with the spice of the chili powder.  It ended up having a good amount of heat without being overbearing and taking over our taste buds.  The cheese was the perfect amount.  The quinoa ended up also being really good.  I think I liked it more than regular Mexican rice and the fact that it's healthier doesn't hurt either.  We added some sour cream to the side and a perfect fork bite was a mix of the enchiladas with quinoa, topped with a little sour cream.  It was a great meal for the weather due to its heat, both temperature and flavor.  We have a lot of leftovers which is ok I think b/c we found out this morning they're really good cold :) YUM!!

Bring on the meatballs!

I seem to have fallen in love with meatballs these past couple of months.  I really wanted to make them but didn't want pasta since we had already eaten a lot of pasta that week so instead, I decided to make sandwiches.  I've made these meatballs before but I changed a couple of things so the sauce would be a little different.  The sauce and meatballs are from scratch and I definitely think there's a difference between store bought and homemade.

The ingredients I used were:

ground beef

salt

pepper

parmesan cheese

garlic powder

onion

egg

garlic

parsley

bay leaf

breadcrumbs

whole canned roma tomatoes

tomato sauce

basil

crushed red pepper

So I started with the sauce since I wanted it to cook for a few hours.  I chopped up the onions and garlic and let them cook down in a pan until it softened a bit but not too soft.  Then, I added the tomato sauce and tomatoes.  For the tomatoes, I put them in a bowl first and crushed them with my hands.  The parmesan cheese, bay leaf, parsley, crushed red pepper, and basil were also added and then mixed the entire thing.  The sauce was heated until it got bubbly then the heat was turned down to low and allowed to simmer. 

Next, I mixed and formed the meatballs.  I put the beef in a bowl and added garlic powder, parmesan cheese, breadcrumbs, an egg, basil, and oregano.  Then I formed them to be about the size of my palm. They were carefully dropped into the sauce and covered the pan.  These cooked for about 3 hours.

The spooned the sauce over the meatballs so they were covered and I made sure to stir them around every so often just so nothing was sticking to the bottom of the pan.

Once they were done, I put them on some buns with some mozzerella cheese and cut up pepperoncinis.

 

These were pretty delicious.  The cheese topping made them perfect for me.  I think these are a really good substitute when you're in the mood for Italian or pizza b/c they really have all the elements of both but in sandwich form.  They are super hot though so make sure to let them cool a bit before biting into them.  It can be difficult b/c the house smells soooo good after 3 hours of cooking and by then you should be pretty hungry.  I put 4 meatballs on each sandwich and ended up with 5 leftover which made for good leftovers later.  Unfortunately, I couldn't eat them due to my teeth being pulled but Eric was gracious enough to eat them in my place :)

Don't underestimate the little guy

I'm still alive and still blogging! Sorry I have been MIA lately.  Four of my precious teeth of wisdom were removed last week and although I had saved dinners to blog while I was on the couch and in pain, the pain took over and so did the pain pills.  Needless to say, blogging did not and really could not happen. I'm not really sure why God felt it necessary to give us 4 extra teeth that don't grow properly or fit in our mouths but it is not a fun process.  I am still in pain and can't really open my mouth wide enough to eat anything extra delicious but I am making due.

So now onto my first "saved eats" from 2 weeks go! Let's hope I still remember this process.  Two Thursdays ago, we had the alarm guy come and work on our alarm system so I had to be home all day to let him in and be around while he was working.  For me this meant prepping dinner Wednesday night so I had it already available Thursday so I didn't have to leave for the store.  One thing I have been wanting to make for some time is beef short ribs.  With the change in the weather this seemed appropriate, even though that day ended up being beautiful and not Fall/Winter-like at all.

This process began the night before, sat overnight and was baked the next day.  I did my best to take as many pics as possible but I was also making dinner for Wednesday at the same time.  Here were the ingredients:

4 lbs short ribs

salt

pepper

onion

carrots

celery

garlic

1 bottle red wine

thyme

chicken stock

To start, I chopped up the veggies and put them in a bowl set aside.  Then, using a dry paper towel, I dried each rib.  Using a dutch oven and some canola oil, I heated the oil and then browned the ribs on each side until "crusty." I did this in 2 batches since they wouldn't all fit at once and then removed them from the pot and put them in a baking dish. 

Once the beef was out, the veggies were added to the pot and allowed to cook until very soft.  This took about 30 minutes over very low heat.  The wine and thyme were added next and allowed to come to a boil over high heat. 

Once that mixture boiled, I poured it over the baking dish and let it sit at room temperature until it cooled.  Then, I covered it with foil and put it in the fridge to sit overnight.  The next morning, I turned all the ribs over.

The next afternoon, I put the ribs and junk/marinade back into the dutch oven.  This is when the chicken stock was added and brought to a boil on the stovetop.  Once boiling, the pot went into the oven and cooked for about 1 1/2 hours.  Then, I removed the lid and braised the ribs for another hour.  I made sure to remove the ribs every 15 minutes or so and turned them.  I let the sauce reduce to about half which equaled about 2 cups of liquid.

After the pot was removed from the oven, the meat was removed and I placed it in a clean baking dish and took out the bones.  The remains in the pot were strained the I put the junk in a separate container for the dog :)

The remaining liquid was then poured over the ribs and the dish was put back in the oven under the broiler for the liquid to turn into glaze.  I let it cook for about 10 minutes.

I decided to serve this dish with mashed potatoes, which I didn't take pictures of since I have posted about mashed potatoes before.  The process hasn't changed at all :) I decided to use red-skinned to keep some structure so they could be chunky and not as mashed as russet usually are.

OK! So final product:

These turned out really well.  I'm glad that I finally took the time to make them because it's definitely a great cold day meal.  They had a great sweetness to them while also having some tart aspects from the wine.  The meat was so tender and fall of the bone which was great.  I think the mashed potatoes were a good touch b/c they added the aspect of salt to the dish and I think were a better touch than rice or noodles.  This meal definitely takes some prep time but I think if you have time to make dinner and decide to plan ahead, this is a great dish to try!

Creamy, Cheesy Goodness

We had planned on eating leftovers for dinner last night but since I eat leftovers all day (due to my bad habit of snacking), I just don't ever want them for dinner.  So instead, I decided that something with chicken would be good.  I feel like we don't eat chicken very often unless it's rotisserie since that's already cooked.  I'm always weird about cooking chicken just b/c I feel like it's almost always dry...kind of like my past fear of making pork.  However, it sounded good and I pre-planned tonight's dinner to be beef so I didn't want to do 2 days of red meat in a row.

One of our favorites is chicken marsala but since I've made that before, I thought I'd find something a little different.  I found a recipe on Food Network that was a chicken marsala with a mascarpone/dijon sauce that sounded delicious and easy to make.  The ingredients were:

chicken

mascarpone

dijon

salt

pepper

onion

mushroom

garlic

parsley

butter

marsala

To begin, I chopped up the onion, garlic, and parsley so all of my ingredients were ready to go.  I had to prepare a little more for this dinner since I was making tonight's dinner at the same time so lots going on in the kitchen.  The chicken was cut into thirds and browned in a pan with some olive oil.  Once browned, I took it out of the pan and put it in a plate and set it aside. 

Next, some butter was added to the same pan and the onions were put in it to soften a bit.  Once they were soft, the mushrooms and garlic were added and cooked for about 20 minutes until all the liquid was cooked out and the mushrooms were very soft.  I used baby bellas but you can choose a different type if you like.

While this was cooking down, I cut the chicken into thin strips.  Also, I started boiling some water b/c I decided to serve this dish wish some ravioli.  This can also be thrown on top of pasta of any type but since we just recently ate pasta, I decided to switch it up and make raviolis instead.  I bought some from  Whole Foods that I thought would be a good flavor mix with the chicken.  They cooked for about 8 minutes.

Once the mushrooms were cooked down, I added the marsala and let it cook down and reduce by half.   At this point, the mascarpone and dijon were added and mixed in until it was uniform.  I added the salt and pepper at this point too.

The chicken was then thrown into the pan and I turned the heat down and let the mixture simmer.  This cooked until the chicken was cooked through.  Make sure to turn it so the stuff on the bottom doesn't burn.  Once the chicken was no longer pink, the parsley was added and tossed.  It cooked for about 2 minutes and then the meal was done.  For timing, the ravioli went in the pot at the same time as the mascarpone and dijon.  This caused the ravioli to be done at almost the same time as the chicken so it was still hot when plated.

To finish, I put the ravioli in a bowl, topped with the chicken mix, cracked some pepper, and then topped it all with grated parmesan cheese.

SO...this was pretty delicious.  If you've ever been to Maggiano's and had a dish called Rigatoni D, this tastes pretty similar to that.  The sauce was such a great creamy, sweet, cheesy mixture of awesome.  I'm glad I chose the kind of ravioli that I did b/c I think the pesto was a good touch to the sauce.  However, I definitely think this would have been good on any kind of pasta.  When making it, I was worried that I had made it too salty but once paired with the ravioli and the chicken was added, the saltiness ended up being a great addition to the rest of the flavors.  My main regret with this dish is that I don't have any pasta leftovers to serve it with or enough leftovers in general.  Even though I was so full last night, I feel like I could've eaten at least another full bowl of this stuff just b/c it was so good.