From Our Kitchen: Baja Chicken Fajitas

I don't know about you guys, but I love fajitas! Interestingly enough, I hate the onions and green peppers in fajitas, but just the simple act of compiling all my own goodies in a warm tortilla is something this girl loves. Several years ago, when I first ordered fajitas at On the Border, I was amazed at my options in building the perfect fajita. Not only do you get to choose the meat(s) you want on your sizzling pan, but you also get to choose from three different veggie options. I know one is the traditional onions and green peppers (yeck), and one is squash, zucchini, and red pepper (yum), and I don't remember the third. Now, seeing as I looooove squash and zucchini and red pepper (everyone finds this weird since I don't like green peppers, but I firmly stand by my stance that they taste very different), I was sold on this particular combination, and, to this day, OTB is still my favorite place to get fajitas for this very reason. I decided last week that I wanted to take a stab at recreating this dish at home. I didn't follow any recipe, and just kind of winged it, but really, it's pretty basic, yes? I forgot to take a bunch of pics, so you will have to settle for two, but it was really delicious and super easy!

What You'll Need:

• 3 or 4 chicken breasts
• Fajita seasoning packet, or combination of cumin, ground red pepper, chili powder, etc
• Splash or two of lime juice
• 2 - 3 tbsp olive oil
• 2 yellow squash
• 2 zucchini
• 1 red bell pepper
• Ground cumin, ground red pepper, and salt, to taste
• tortillas
• toppings: cheese, guacamole, sour cream, salsa, whatever your heart desires!

What You'll Do:

1. Cook your chicken. Now there are obviously several options here: you can cook it in a frying pan on the stove until done, and then add fajita seasoning and water as directed. Or, you can do as I did, and cook it in a crockpot to get some nice shredded chicken (I know, not your typical cooking for fajita chicken, but was really delicious!). If you go the shredded chicken route, spray your crockpot, place chicken breast inside, pour in about 1/4 cup of water or chicken broth, pour seasoning on top and toss to coat. Cook on low for about 4 hours, or high for about 2. Shred with forks when cooked through, and give a couple splashes of lime juice.
2. Heat olive oil in a large saucepan, and add squash, zucchini, and red pepper. Cook down for about 3 or 4 minutes, and then add ground cumin, ground red pepper, and salt, to taste. Continue cooking until veggies are tender, but not mushy!
3. Wrap tortillas in aluminum foil, and warm in the oven for 10 minutes.
4. Top warm tortilla with chicken, veggies, and various toppings of your choice. Enjoy!

From Our Kitchen: Chicken Salsa

For some reason, unbeknownst to me, I have been bringing out the crockpot more frequently here lately. I usually reserve my crockpot cooking for the fall and winter times, which, really, makes absolutely no sense because crockpots keep your kitchen from getting overheated, which, really makes them perfect for the summer months, but whatever. Most of my crockpot recipes are soups and stews and the like, so here we are back to fall and winter times. What a difficult conundrum.

Chicken Salsa, however, is a great crockpot recipe for pretty much anytime of the year. I purposely did not take a picture of this because it is not a pretty recipe, but it is terribly yummy, which totally makes up for appearances, yes? I told my coworker friend, David R. (isn't it like first grade again when you have to identify someone by their last initial because someone else in the class has their name?) that I would put this recipe up on the blog for him, so here you are, David!

What You'll Need:

• 4 frozen chicken breasts
• 1 jar of your favorite salsa (I personally loooove Tostito's restaurant style salsa)
• 1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
• 1 can corn, drained
• 8 oz cream cheese (I usually go with 1/3 reduced fat variety)

What You'll Do:

1. Spray inside of crockpot. Place chicken breasts in bottom of crockpot. Pour beans and corn over chicken. Cook on low for 6 hours, or high for 4 hours.
2. When chicken is cooked through, shred chicken with two forks. Continue cooking for another 30 minutes - 1 hour to allow chicken to absorb juices and flavors.
3. Cut cream cheese into large chunks, and mix in until well incorporated. Cook an additional 30 minutes
4. Serve over rice (Harris' preference) or in a tortilla (mine)
5. Enjoy!

Easy peasy, but oh so good!

From Our Kitchen: Chicken Enchilada Stuffed Zucchini Boats

We love the Mexican food in this house! Well, the Mexican food, and the Thai food, and the Indian food, and the Pizza food...well, you get it. At any rate, we really do love the Mexican food, and I have been on a mission for veggies, veggies, veggies in our lives, so when I stumbled upon this here recipe, I pinned away and mentally told myself to remember put the ingredients on my grocery list (spoiler alert: I remembered!). As always, I made some modifications (mostly in the form of being toooooootally lazy and not making my own enchilada sauce). This was so yummy, like ridiculously yummy, especially if you are like me and absolutely adore zucchini...you do, don't you? Okay, good! I apologize in advance - things were happening so quickly, I failed in some of my picture taking, and it smelled so good when I took it out of the oven, I totally forgot to take a final pic. Trust me, though, it turned out pretty and oh so yummy!

What You'll Need:

• 4 medium zucchini
• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1/2 yellow onion
• 3 cloves garlic (or two big heaping spoonfuls if, like yours truly, you buy the jarred garlic)
• 3 chicken breasts, cooked and shredded (I like to cook mine in the crockpot and then shred)
• 1 tsp. cumin
• 1 tsp. chili powder
• 1/2 tsp cayenne pepper
• 3 tbsp chicken broth
• 1 tbsp tomato paste
• 1 can enchilada sauce
• shredded cheese
• salt and pepper, to taste

What You'll Do:

1. Preheat your oven to 400 degrees, and spray a 9x13 pan with Pam. Begin boiling a large pot of water.
2. Cut zucchini in half lengthwise. Using a scooper, melon baller, or small spoon, scoop out the flesh to about 1/4 inch thick.
   
   
   
   
   
   
3. Chop the scooped flesh, and set aside.
4. Drop zucchini in boiling water. Blanch for 1-2 minutes, and remove from water. Set aside.
   
   
   
5. In a large pan, heat oil. Add onion and garlic. Cook until onion is translucent.
6. Add zucchini, salt and pepper. Cook about 4 minutes.
7. Add spices, broth, and tomato paste. Cook another 3 minutes.
   
8. Add cooked, shredded chicken. Cook 3 minutes.
9. Place 1/4 cup enchilada sauce in bottom of casserole dish.
10. Fill each zucchini boat with chicken mixture. Place in casserole dish.
    
    
    
11. Top each boat with enchilada sauce and shredded cheese.
12. Bake for 25 minutes.