Tamale Pie

This recipe takes a ton of different ingredients, but don't let that scare you off! Most (or all) of the ingredients are the type of stuff you have lying around the kitchen (at least we did) and the recipe itself is not very complicated.


One tamale pie - about six servings

3 Tbs oil
1 onion, diced
1 clove garlic, diced
1 lb (500 g) ground beef or turkey (we used the typical German pork/beef mix)
1 tsp salt
2 Tbs sugar
2 tsp white vinegar
8 ounces tomato sauce (we used 400 g pizza tomatoes)
15 ounces beans - black, pinto, or kidney (we used 1 1/2 400 g cans of kidney beans)
2 cups corn (if frozen thaw first)
1/3 cup flour
2/3 cup cornmeal
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup butter milk (we used 1% milk with a little melted butter added)
1 egg
1 cup grated cheese (cheddar would be great but we only had Gouda)
Spice - we used chili flakes and spicy paprika

Preheat the oven to 400 F (200 C)

~If you have a pan that can be used on the stove and in the oven this is the time to use it. We do not so we did everything in a pan on the stove and then transferred it to a glass baking dish. ~

Heat 1 Tbs oil (not all the oil!) in the pan over medium heat. Saute the onion until it is translucent. This may take up to seven or eight minutes. Add the garlic and cook for another minute. Add the ground beef and cook until it is cooked through (brown and crumbly).

Add the beans, corn, tomato sauce, vinegar, spice, 1/2 tsp salt (not all the salt!), 1 tsp sugar (not all the sugar!). Simmer until everything is hot through.


This is a good time to taste do a taste test because after this point you will not be able to add anything to fix the flavor!




While the bean mixture is heating on the stove, mix the cornmeal, flour, baking powder, the remaining 1/2 tsp salt, and the remaining 1 Tbs sugar. Whisk in the egg, buttermilk, and remaining 2 Tbs oil. Mix in 1/2 cup grated cheese.







Transfer the bean mixture (if you are like us and do not have a pan that can be used in the oven) to something ovenproof. Pour the batter over the  bean mixture. Cover with the remaining 1/2 cup cheese.

Bake for about 20 minutes (check after 15 minuets) or until the cornbread on top is nice and brown.

Hard to serve and keep it looking pretty but extremely tasty. It is like chili and cornbread all in one dish!

This recipe was adapted from Catherine Newman

Taco Salad

After making our baked fajitas last week we were still craving Mexican food but had no tortillas or chicken. Instead of going out and buying more we decided to get creative and made taco salad for dinner. Not much healthier than a normal dinner of Mexican food but a nice change and a quick way to use any leftovers in the fridge you may have.


Two large salads:

1/3 lb ground beef
1 onion, diced
1/2 to 1 bell pepper, diced
3/4 - 1 can kidney beans
1/2 can diced tomatoes
2 hot peppers, diced 
sugar, salt, red pepper flakes, pepper, oregano
3-4 cups shredded lettuce (or as much as you wan)
cheese
sour cream
tortilla chips

In a pan over medium heat. Cook your onions, bell pepper, hot peppers, and ground beef. Once the beef is fully cooked, drain off the excess fat and return to the stove.





 
Add the kidney beans and tomatoes. Start with 1/2 Tbs of sugar and continue to add until the sweetness is how you would like it. Add a pinch of salt and a healthy dash of oregano, red pepper flakes, and pepper.

Cook until everything is heated and the tomato sauce begins to reduce.

During this time place the lettuce in a bowl or on a plate. Top with a handful of nacho chips.

When the ground beef/tomato mixture is finished. Pour on top of the lettuce and top with a spoonful of sour cream and some cheese.

Enjoy!

One Pan Baked Chicken Fajitas

We know that we have blogged a chicken fajita recipe before and boy are they good. We love that recipe but the problem is that it is time consuming and leaves a lot of dirty dishes to clean up. Sometimes we want tasty fajitas without much effort. For those days we use a fajita recipe that uses only one pan. Yes, ONE PAN. Clean up is simple and the entire meal is quick to put together... something everyone needs after a long hard day.

For about six fajitas:

100 to 150 grams chicken, sliced into strips
1 can diced tomatoes
1 onion, sliced
1 bell pepper, sliced
2-3 chilies, diced (depending on spice level you want)
1 Tbs oil
2 tsp chili powder
2 tsp cumin
1/2 tsp garlic powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp oregano





Tortillas and toppings you want. We used cheese, sour cream, lettuce and hot sauce (yes, we know lettuce is not typical for fajitas but we like the extra crunch).






Preheat the oven to 200 C (400 F).


In a baking pan, mix the chicken, tomatoes, sliced onion and bell pepper, and hot chilies.

Pour the oil and herbs and spices over the chicken mixture and mix well so that everything is covered.

Bake uncovered for 20-25 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through.






Serve with warm tortillas and any toppings you want.


 



On the side we ate our favorite Mexican rice and nacho chips.

Oh was it soo good and the clean up was super easy with just one pan to wash.

This recipe was adapted from Eatin' on the Cheap

Chicken Fajitas

We never really thought about making fajitas at home until we had them out at a restaurant and realized they are no harder than burritos to put together.

We stuck with just chicken, marinated in a lime juice mixture. Added grilled onions, pepper, and all the toppings we love such as fresh salsa and guacamole and served with our favorite Mexican rice recipe and nachos as a starter. 


The whole meal was just as good as when we eat out, with the perk of being 30 euros cheaper and we had leftovers for the next day :)

Marinade (enough chicken for 5-6 fajitas)

*Warning* She just dumped a whole bunch of stuff into a bowl and marinated the chicken. Oops! Use your best judgement with the measurements : ) *

200 g chicken breast (cut into strips)
2-3 cloves of garlic
2 Tbs onion, diced
2 Tbs green onion, diced
1/4 cup lime juice
1 Tbs oil
salt, pepper, pepper flakes, and garlic powder

Let the chicken marinade for at least three hours. We left it for closer to six hours.



When it is time to get cooking:

3 onions
2 bell peppers (bell peppers are really expensive in Germany right now so we used frozen strips)
Package of flour tortillas (fajita size) - You can also make your own but since we were making nachos, Mexican rice, salsa, and Guacamole we felt tortillas would just be too much
Oil


Toppings - Lettuce, cheese, sour cream, guacamole, salsa (or diced tomatoes)


Preheat the oven to 350 F (180C).

If you want to make Mexican rice, start that before you start the chicken. It will take about 20 minutes.


Slice each onion into half and then each half into 3-4 wedges. Thread the onion wedges onto skewers. We used wooden skewers leftover from another recipe that had been soaked for a few hours in water. Use a brush to brush oil onto the onions. This will help them get nice and brown.

Move the chicken into an oven-safe dish (keep it in its marinade!). Bake for about 10 minutes or until chicken loses its pink color. If the strips are thin it should not take very long. At the same time cook the onions in the oven.



Move the onions up in the oven and use broil if after 10-15 minutes of being in the oven they are not getting a slight brown to them.






While the chicken and onions cook, make the salsa and guacamole. With about five minutes cooking time left on the chicken, slice the bell pepper into strips and cook on the stove with a small amount of oil.

Remove the onions and chicken from the oven and the onions from their skewers.





Once the bell pepper has gotten soft, add the onions and let get hot. Add the chicken with all of the marinade. Let cook until most of the marinade has been soaked up or cooked off. This should only take a few minutes.


While the peppers, onions, and chicken cook together, heat your tortillas in the oven.









Remove fajita insides from heat.
Serve with your toppings of choice and with Mexican rice. 

Fresh Chunky Salsa and Guacamole

If you are making anything Mexican such as tacos, burritos or fajitas from scratch you might as well go all out and make the salsa and guacamole from scratch too. Fresh salsa and guacamole is also good with plain nacho chips. Eat it as an appetizer or put it out at a party for everyone to snack on. The good thing is you can't really mess these recipes up. Play with the amount of lime juice and salt you like and find your perfect mixture.




We like these with our burrito recipe, nachos, or fajitas.


Chunky Salsa:




2 tomatoes
1 Tbs onion, diced
1 hot pepper, diced (optional)
1 tsp lime juice
few shakes of salt and pepper

 





Dice the tomatoes in medium to small squares. Mix with the onion, hot pepper, lime juice and seasoning. Add more lime juice or salt if needed.


Guacamole 



1 avocado
1-2 Tbs onion, diced
1-2 Tbs tomato, diced
2 tsp lime juice
few shakes of salt










Scoop out the center of the avocado. Add tomatoes, onions, lime juice, and salt. Mash with a fork until smooth. Add more lime juice or salt as needed.





We always make these at the same time so we use one onion between the two dishes and steal some of the tomatoes from the salsa to add to guacamole.

Better than the Box Mexican Rice

This Mexican rice is easy to make and only takes about 25 minutes. It is better than any Mexican rice from the box we have ever tried and goes with tacos, burritos, enchiladas and even plain. Take the extra few minutes to make it from scratch and you will not be disappointed.




We have multiplied this recipe in many different combinations and it has always worked so feel free to play around with the amount if you are having company for dinner.




2 Tbs vegetable oil
1 cup uncooked rice
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp garlic
1/4 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup plain tomato sauce
2 cups chicken broth



 



Heat the oil in a large saucepan over medium. Add the rice and stir often until it is golden. During this time season with salt and garlic.








Add the onions and cook until beginning to get glassy.

Stir in tomato sauce and chicken broth, bring to a boil and then reduce to low. Cover and simmer for 20-25 minutes.











                             Yum!

HOT! Beef Chili

This chili is HOT! When we say hot, we mean, the two of us, who love spicy foods, had our noses running the entire time we ate dinner. It was that spicy. But don't let this discourage you! If you are not the biggest fan of spicy foods we still recommend making this dish...just leave out the spice and add it later if you decide it needs an extra kick. She says this is all American! He says it is definitely Mexican. It doesn't matter because this beef chili is good any way you serve it, so you have no excuses not to cook up a pot!


To make two big portions or three small:

1/2 lb ( ~250 g) ground beef
7 jalapenos or hot chilies (I don't think anyone sane uses this many but we do!)
1 red bell pepper, chopped
1 onion, chopped
1/2 bulb (or 2-3 cloves) garlic, chopped
2 tsp tomato paste
2 cans of diced tomatoes (keep liquid)
2 tsp basil
2-3 bay leaves
1 medium can corn
1 can kidney beans
salt, pepper and cayenne pepper to taste

In a large pot on the stove cook the ground beef with the onions, garlic, tomato paste and bell pepper .






Once browned, add chilies, diced tomatoes and seasonings.





Cover and cook for about 20 minutes on medium to medium-low. About 15 minutes in, add the kidney beans and corn. Let finish cooking and if needed add salt, pepper and cayenne pepper.

Serve hot and HOT!

Leftover Thanksgiving: Tacos with Corn Tortillas

We made these recipes with Thanksgiving especially in mind, and the leftovers that you might have and need to get rid of over the next week. Making interesting meals, instead of just turkey sandwich after turkey sandwich will get you through your leftovers without getting fed up with the massive amounts of boring turkey. Like we said in our previous post Thanksgiving Day Dinner, we made two chickens and therefore this recipe was made with chicken meat. Turkey works just as well, so don't let it fool you! Make a little Mexican out of your all-American Thanksgiving Dinner!

We felt that we needed a change from our regular flour tortillas and so we decided this time to try corn tortillas. What we found out is that it is much much much easier to mix up the dough and roll out than flour tortillas. We might just have a new favorite :)

For ~ 6 medium sized tortillas you need:
2 cups corn flour (or masa harina)
1 1/4 cup boiling water + 1-4 tsp more
1 tsp oil
1 tsp salt

Mix the salt and the flour (don't mix up cornmeal and corn flour, cornmeal will not work!) Add 1 1/4 cup boiling water and oil and mix with a fork. It will be hot so wait a few minutes before you try to knead it with your hands (he learned this lesson the hard way!)






Once the dough is cool enough knead it with your hands for  2 to 3 minutes. The dough should stick together but not be sticky. You will need to add more boiling water to get it to this state. Do this slowly, adding only 1 tsp at a time. We had to add 3 tsp to get our dough the perfect consistency.




Roll the dough into balls (we like medium sized tortillas so we made balls halfway between a golf ball and tennis ball in size). Use a tortilla press or roll out using a rolling pin. Best is to put plastic wrap or parchment paper over and under the dough while rolling so it is sure not to stick.





We rolled out our dough and then used a plate as a circle outline to cut our tortillas into proper tortilla shape.









Heat a pan (no oil) on high heat (best is a cast iron skillet but we do not own one) and wait to add the tortillas, one at a time, until it is very very hot. Cook on each side for about 1 minute. Put the tortillas in aluminum foil or wrap in a towel to keep warm.


 

For the taco insides we used:

1 1/2 cup chopped chicken (or turkey) leftover from Thanksgiving
1/2 cup mushrooms, sliced
1 large onion, chopped
2 tomatoes, chopped
1/2 bell pepper, chopped
Seasonings like pepper, salt, garlic powder, oregano and bail



 Heat a pan on medium with a small amount of oil. Add the chicken, mushrooms, onion, bell pepper and onion. Cook until hot and onions start to get soft. Add seasonings and tomatoes. Finish cooking through.








Serve on the corn tortilla with lettuce, sour cream, cheese, and hot sauce. We did not have any sour cream or cheese but our tacos were still delicious. Eat alone or with rice and beans.

Enjoy this different type of recipe to use up your turkey!

Cheater's Enchiladas

This is the lazy man's version of enchiladas (hence the name, Cheater's Enchiladas) which was perfect for us the other night when we wanted to use up the tortillas and ground beef we had. These enchiladas are good, especially for the minimum effort they require, but they are not great. We recommend trying the same recipe with corn tortillas and enchilada sauce if you have the ingredients available.

Ingredients:
3 Large (burrito sized) flour tortillas
1 1/2 Cups tomato sauce
1/2 lb ground beef
1 Cup shredded cheese
1/2 Cup sour cream
1 Onion, chopped
4 Hot peppers, chopped
1 bulb garlic
salt, pepper, and other seasonings

Cook the ground beef with the onion, peppers and garlic. Add seasonings such as pepper, salt, oregano and basil. Pour 1/2 cup tomato sauce into the bottom of an oven-safe dish.



Once the beef is finished, lay out a flour tortilla (it i easier to bend them if you heat them up in the oven for about one minute first). Place 1/3 of the ground beef, a small amount of cheese, and two spoonfuls of sour cream into the tortilla.


Wrap like a burrito and place in the dish with tomato sauce. Repeat for the remaining two tortillas.



Once finished, pour the rest of the tomato sauce over the tortillas, use the rest of the cheese on top, and bake covered at 350 for 25-30 minutes.


Serve this Mexican treat with Mexican rice, beans and the rest of the sour cream.