Archive for the ‘tex mex’ Category

Homemade taco seasoning.

Sunday, August 22nd, 2010

We enjoy Mexican food in this house once a week if not every couple weeks so taco seasoning is a regular item we pick up from the grocery store (Lawry’s brand). There are few things worse than canceling our taco plans because we don’t have any seasoning in the cupboard. Well last time we were at the grocery I knew we didn’t have taco seasoning at home (it was on the list), but walking through the spice section I was like nah, I’ll just make it myself. I’d been wanting to make chimichanga’s for several days and needed something to spice up the beef (grass fed beef of course). Time for homemade taco seasoning! It was actually quite simple, I used the first recipe I found online from AllRecipes.com which had a five star rating (or close too) out of about 1,600 reviews. That’s usually a good sign. I had most of the spices here except for crushed red pepper flakes which I know we have somewhere but I haven’t seen ‘em in a while and I didn’t really want ‘em in there for little Z’s sake. The seasoning came out pretty hot so she still couldn’t eat any meat that had been seasoned anyway, but I always set aside some with just salt and pepper for her anyway, just in case. It wasn’t quite as good as Lawry’s but when I looked at the ingredients of Lawry’s it had sugar and cocoa powder in it. It does add a little more sweetness to it so I’ll most likely be messing around with adding those two ingredients next time as well. Maybe add a little sugar yourself when you make it. If it works out better for my taste I’ll update this recipe here.

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Pita bread pizza.

Sunday, March 14th, 2010

Easy peasy! Want a quick dinner, lunch, breakfast or snack. Grab a piece of (whole wheat) pita bread and top it how you wish. I didn’t feel like making a tomato sauce or opening a whole can of spaghetti sauce for a couple tablespoons so a little K&M barbecue sauce from Spring Hill, Kansas would do me perfect right now. I topped it with goodies I had in the fridge, fresh grated parmesan, freshly crumbled feta, mixed medley cherry tomatoes, and fresh thyme. For sauce you could use anything you want really. White alfredo, buffalo sauce, pesto, nacho cheese, steak sauce, spicy mayo, hollandaise, and on and on…. It’s so easy to make just bake in oven till cheeses melt at around 400 degrees. Done now eat!

Cornbread and beans.

Monday, February 22nd, 2010

I assume J was craving some cornbread because when I walked into the kitchen she was whipping some up. That’s it, just cornbread for dinner. We all know cornbread could be a meal by itself but I still felt it needed a side to go with it (wink). A search for “what goes with cornbread” gave me some yahoo answers. Beans of course! So then hitting foodgawker I came across this quick and easy beans and cornbread at recipegirl. I didn’t have time to bake beans with bacon and all that jazz. Since the pan of cornbread had already been slid into the oven time was of the essence. So a can of bush’s chili beans with sauce and a can of white beans for a nice contrast of color would do (plus there was a lot of sauce in the previous can of beans made a nice mix). I heated it in a small saucepan on med low simmering up until the cornbread was ready. In the meantime I diced some ripe tomatoes, chopped some fresh cilantro, took out some shredded cheese and sour cream, and I still had a few minutes to spare before the cornbread was ready to be pulled out. Quick and simple. To plate just scoop some beans next to a piece of cornbread, plop some sour cream on top, add cheese, tomatoes, cilantro and you’re done!