White Chicken Chili

White Chicken Chili
4-6 chicken breasts, chopped into 1/2 inch pieces
1 cup chopped jalapenos
1/2 small white onion, minced
2 tbsp. minced garlic
Olive oil
1/4 cup taco sauce, hot
3 cups chicken broth
4 cans pinto beans - rinse and drain 2 cans
Rice

1.  Heat oil in a stock pot over medium heat. When hot, but not smoking, add jalapenos, onion, and garlic. Cook for 1 minute then add chopped chicken. Cook chicken thoroughly.
2. Add taco sauce to chicken to coat well, cook for 1 minute longer.
3. Add chicken broth and pinto beans. Cook until beans are warmed through.
4. Add rice to thicken soup, usually about 2 cups uncooked rice. Continue to simmer, covered, until rice is cooked.
5. Serve with crushed tortilla chips, sour cream, shredded cheese, jalapenos, hot sauce.

Mexican Chicken Bake

Mexican Chicken Bake

 

This one is super delicious. We have it at least 2-3 times per month. Adjust to your desired level of spicy, we're on the medium-high end with this recipe.

 

Ingredients:

4-5 Chicken breasts

Dash or two of olive oil (we used jalapeno infused)

2 TBSP minced garlic

2 TBSP Taco Seasoning (or one packet)

1/2 cup jalapeno slices

1 can pinto beans

1 can black beans

1/4 cup hot taco sauce

1/2 cup hot salsa

Shredded cheese of your choice - 1 cup with 1/4 cup reserved

2 cups water - for rice

2 cups rice

Lime juice, if desired

Tortilla chips

 

 

 

 

1. Cut chicken into bite sized pieces. Preheat oven to 350. Heat olive oil in pan. Add garlic to pan and let cook for 30 seconds. DO NOT LET IT BURN! It gets very bitter if the garlic burns. Add chicken to pan and cook thoroughly.

2. Add taco seasoning and mix well. May need to add a few sprinkles of water if you don't have much liquid. 

3. Dice jalapenos and add to pan. Let cook for a few minutes. Will get very aromatic! Start water for rice.
4. Add beans, sauces, and salsa. Reduce heat to medium low and cover.
5. When the water for the rice comes to a boil, add the rice. Cook as directions stated on package.
6. When rice is nearly done, add cheese to chicken/bean mixture - save 1/4 cup. Continuously stir so it gets to be a melty mess.

7. Transfer rice into a oven safe container that has a lid. (We use a Le Cruset dutch oven)

8. Sprinkle lime juice over rice and stir. Add the cheesy bean and chicken mixture to the top. Spread evenly.

9. Crush tortilla chips over the top of the chicken. Sprinkle remaining cheese on top and cover. Place in oven at 350 for 15 minutes to melt cheese.

Loaded Baked Potato Bites

Loaded Baked Potato Bites

These are a yummy side or appetizer to go with any meal.

Makes ~14-16 bites

 

Ingredients:

Instant mashed potatoes - prepared for 4-6 people *or use leftover mashed potatoes*

Olive oil

1/4 cup chopped chives

1 egg, beaten

1/2 cup shredded cheese

Sour cream, cheese and chives to top

1. Heat a few teaspoons of oil in a pan. Combine mashed potatoes with egg, chives, and cheese. Mix well.
2. Add enough olive oil to make a sticky, consistent mixture.
3. Shape into ~ 1-2 inch balls and flatten to 1/2 inch thick.
4. Add to pan and brown on both sides (~1-2 minutes per side on medium).

5. Top with more cheese, sour cream and chives if desired. Enjoy!!

Pierogi Lasagna

Pierogi Lasagna

I failed like crazy to get a picture of this for the last 3 times we have had it. It is so good and I'm usually so hungry I can't wait to snap a pic before I eat. You'll have to deal.

 

Makes 1 13x9 pan of lasagna. Feeds 4 if you're fatties like the two of us and have half a pan for dinner.

 

12 Lasagna noodles

Instant mashed potatoes, milk, butter, and water - for enough potatoes to serve 6 per box

8 oz cream cheese

1/2 cup chopped chives

2 tablespoons garlic

Olive oil

Shredded cheese

Sour cream

 

1. Boil water and begin to cook lasagna noodles based on packaged instructions.

2. Heat oven to 350.

3. When noodles are 1-2 minutes from being cooked, start mashed potatoes.

4. Remove noodles when finished. Sprinkle with olive oil to prevent sticking. Add cream cheese to potatoes. Continue to stir until all has been incorporated and melted. Add chives and 1/2 cup shredded cheese to potatoes and stir well.

5. Oil pan on bottom and sides well. Place 3 noodles on bottom of pan and sprinkle a little shredded cheese on top. Spread 1/3 of the potatoes on top of these noodles. Add more shredded cheese. Repeat process until all potatoes and noodles are used. Sprinkle more shredded cheese to the top layer of the noodles. Cover with foil and cook for 35 minutes on 350.

6. After removing from oven, take off foil and let sit for 5 minutes. Slice, serve, and top with sour cream. Enjoy!!

 

 

Black Bean Soup

You could change this soup up so many ways. Add shredded chicken, add roasted corn, put some avocado in there... the possibilities are endless!! This is just the plain black bean soup that you could edit to your tastes. The recipe will yield at least 2 meals worth for 2 people, depending on how much you eat!

Black Bean Soup
1 cup jalapenos
2 tbsp. minced garlic
Olive oil
3 cups chicken broth
6 cans black beans
1/4 cup taco seasoning
1/2 cup hot salsa
1/4 cup taco sauce, hot
1 cup shredded cheese
1/2 cup sour cream
Toppings: sour cream, cheese, jalapenos, anything you can imagine!

1. Heat a few tsp of oil in a stock pot. When hot, NOT smoking, add chopped jalapenos and garlic. Stir constantly until roasted.
2. Add chicken broth and black beans. No need to drain and rinse the beans.
3. Add sesasoning, salsa, and sauce to pot and stir well.
4. Cook until beans are done through - let them get mushy, you're going to blend it up anyway.
5. Blend with immersion blender until smooth. Add shredded cheese and sour cream and blend again.

German Style Potato and Sausage Stew

It is fall! Time to start eating soup 24/7 and staying in warm clothes and boots for the next 6 months, haha! I whipped this one up last week and could stand to make it again this week. While it isn't the most gorgeous soup ever, it is delightful. Enjoy!

German Style Potato and Sausage Stew

German Style Potato and Sausage Stew
2 tablespoons olive oil
1 package chicken sausage
1 teaspoon cracked black pepper
1 teaspoon caraway seeds
3 cloves garlic
1 bottle lager beer
3 medium carrots, sliced
3 stalks celery, diced
5 medium russet potatoes, cubed
3 cups chicken stock, hot
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
2-3 teaspoons parsley

1. Heat up a medium-sized dutch oven or pot with olive oil over medium heat. When hot, placed sliced chicken sausage into oil. Allow to brown well, the crunchy bits are delicious. Grind the caraway seeds to a fine powder separately.
2. When sausage is done, add garlic, caraway powder, black pepper. When this starts to smell amazing, add the lager slowly. Make sure you scrape the bottom of the pot to get any of the "burned" parts up, should turn your broth very dark.
3. Add the carrots, celery, and potatoes. I chose not to peel my potatoes, but if you want, go for it.  Carefully add the hot chicken stock to the pot. Stir carefully to incorporate everything together.
4. Allow this to cook on medium-medium low until the potatoes are tender, 40-45 minutes.
5. Mash a few of the potatoes to bring the consistency up to your desired thickness.
6. Just before serving, add the ACV and stir well. Top with parsley. I served mine with fresh French bread that I added a few teaspoons of olive oil, sea salt, chile powder, and garlic powder. Then I toasted the sliced bread up for a few minutes in the oven and it was the perfect accompaniment to this rich soup.

See Ya Later Nasty Backyard!

We bought a foreclosure, a foreclosure in pretty bad shape none the less. In August, we will have been here for 2 years. The first year, we spent all our time and energy getting the inside how we wanted it. This spring, we started with the outside. We hired a painting company to revamp the outside and it made quite the impact. Neither of us really know how to deal with high desert climate and how to start landscaping in that climate. So, instead of landscaping a ton, we have decided to do a paver patio with some major flower beds to increase our privacy from the golf course and make it known that people actually live here now! This backyard project was quite a bit of work and there were many times we just wanted to quit. Now that it is done, it was so worth it!

First, we decided on our space taking into account that we wanted the flower beds to flow seamlessly from the patio. We dug down our area between 6-8 inches depending on how far it needed to be to be level... sort of!

When we finished digging down, we filled the hole back up with 3 inches of sand in order to make a solid base for the pavers.

Then we started laying the pavers. I started at the high side of the space and leveled each paver according to the previous one. I worked out in angles to keep it as level as possible. This was the most time consuming part. Only one person could really work on it at a time to preserve the level-ness.

Once the outside edges were done, we could start with the flower beds. I wanted it to be smooth on top and graduated on the bottom, this way it seems more solid to me. That also meant we needed to dig out a pathway for the bottom row to stay level. We did this same process on the flower bed that the previous owner had done, but they had used large boulders as the retaining wall. We also added in a small veggie garden to grow some tomatoes and jalapeno peppers - guacamole anyone?!

Once the patio was finished, we added 100 lbs of playground sand on top and brushed it in each seam to help with the solidity of the patio. We did this over a few days - brushed it around, sprayed it with the hose, let dry. Repeat. When this was all done, we added a small fire pit to the center, some great Target furnishings with Home Depot cushions and voila! Looks much, MUCH better! Now to let some plants grow, grab some more landscaping base rocks to fill in where we had to dig up and our back yard fits in with the much more prestigious homes in the neighborhood!