My tex mex chicken conglomeration

My goal for the summer is to compound and condense my pantry. I am forever running to the store for my bi-weekly trip only to pick up something that I bypassed in my prelist checking or simply finding it buried among other things. So I'm cooking to the pantry. I pull out things and I'm throwing things together bad and good and seeing what works out. Today it was a breezy 90 degree day so we trekked over to the zoo for a quick trip. I knew cooking would be out since the heat always zaps us so I threw something in the crockpot. LIterally. I pulled out stuff from the fridge and my pantry and whipped up 'somethin' good'. Good enough for us to want to make again so I wanted to post about it. I had some chicken breast in the fridge that were thawed so I for sure, wanted to use them up. Plus I have an abundance of black beans (why- I'm clueless) and I've been on a corn kick, salsa kick and spicy kick. Glad that all worked out when I threw all of the team together. We all know that's not always the case. Being that I've been on a salsa, spicy kick, I had to make my 3 ingredient salsa to go along with! I went to a picnic at my cousins's new house last weekend and his wife, SO WONDERFUL, made this INCREDIBLY easy and super delish salsa (my one food vice-HA LOL! Yeah right!) I figured it was a good day for easy, fast and convenient. That being said, I didn't want to give up on flavor, health and family either. Check it out! This lends itself to being very adaptable to what you have on hand too! Try it out!

Tex Mex Crock Pot Chicken

3-4 boneless skinless chicken breast

3/4 c Fat free sour cream

1 can rotel

1 can black beans

1 can corn, drained

1/2 jar salsa

Cheese for topping, opt.

Stir in sour cream and rotel together. Layer in crock pot chicken, sour cream mixture, black beans, corn, onion slices and top with salsa. I cooked on low for 4-5 hours and on high for 1 hour.

3 Ingredient Salsa

3 cans Rotel

1 large bunch cilantro

1 T minced garlic

Blend or process until desired consistency,

YUM!

New Kitchen Toy

Ok so we officially started the Christmas shopping extravaganza this past Sunday. You should of seen me and the DH, we were practically skipping through Target. We definitely felt like the Clauses for sure but part of the reason (a big part) of going to Target was because of this little beauty. In this week's ad they were only 16.99. EEEEK HALF price for a drool-worthy cutie tootie crock pot! I had to have it. Luckily I had the great luck of having a crock pot that was in good need of replacing so I had reasonable ammunition for the purchase of this one!!!


Of course since I bought it Sunday I had to use it right away! Here's what I tried and it was so creamy and scrumptious! MUST TRY!

Crock POt Italian Chicken

4 skinless boneless chicken breasts
2 cans cream of chicken soup (98% less sodium)
1 block cream cheese
1 envelope packet good seasons italian dressing mix

Place chicken in bottom of crock. Mix remaining ingredients together and pour over chicken. Cook on low 6-8 hours and serve over pasta. YUM! Oh so yummy!

With this dish I felt the need for some major veggies to coincide with the load of carbs

Sweet Succotash

1 T grapeseed oil
2 bunches green onions

Saute the onion in oil until just brown. Add

1 bag cascadian farms organic frozen corn
1 bag cascadian farms organic frozen edamama (shelled)
1 large orange or red bell pepper roughly chopped
shake of salt
couple shakes of black pepper
1/4 - 1/2 c broth 1 t cornstarch

Add in veggies to onions. Stir broth and veggies together and pour over mixture. Cook over low heat about 10 minutes until broth thickens.

Leave it and LOVE it

I love my crock pot more than words can express. IT's like a magic little pot of cooking goodness. I just throw some things inside and it works its wonders while I'm away. Sounds like a little bit of magic to me. I tossed this in this morning and LOVED the way this turned out. My MIL recommended this recipe from Kraft the other day and I just obsess about anything with A1 in it. I could *almost* drink the stuff. I love the tanginess, a little peppery and zing. It should be called SHAzAAM sauce or something. A1 is good but I bet SHAzAAM was their second choice. So try this out. It's really yummy. I served it over plain whole grain penne but I think next time I might try it over egg noodles just to see.

A1 stew & sauce

1 package of stew meat
1/4 c A1 sauce
1/4 c water
1 small onion chopped
1 regular can diced tomatoes in juice
2 T flour

Combine all in crockpot and cook on low 6-8 hours. Serve over noodles of choice.

Crock pot love

Shame on me for not posting more often. Moving on. I have this supersonic love for my crock pot and sadly it's home is on my kitchen floor due to lack of cabinet and counter space. It used to be housed on my kitchen shelf in the garage (extension of my cabinets) but I got tired of up and downing the stairs every day or every other. I have a severe affinity for kitchen galore (gadgets, serving trays, plates and fun mania that I can use when I have my pals over) and it never ceases to amaze me at how much stuff I have in this room. Oh well. I love it and don't care. I'm trying a new recipe today and now can't find the webpage. DANG! (winks to Jerm! That was for you mofo) I love all the ingredients here independently and together I thought shazam! This ought to be fantastic! So we're giving it a whirl.

Crock pot chicken

3-4 chicken breasts
1 can Health Valley organic cream of chicken soup
1- 8 oz package fat free cream cheese
1 packet Good Seasons Italian Seasoning/Dressing mix

Place chicken in crock pot and with hand mixer, combine remaining ingredients. Pour over chicken and cook on low 8 hours. Enjoy friends~!

Quick Dinner-Crock pot recipe

So I was cramming for a dinner idea yesterday and was going to try a small turkey in the crock pot but it was frozen solid so that was a no go. I had to come up with something quick because I was off to a Thirty-one party. I found some pork chops in the freezer, I had some left over onion from earlier in the week and some Italian dressing (always a winner) so I threw it all in the crock pot. Here's what I did

Italian Pork Chops

In crock pot I put 3 frozen pork chops

I added about a 1/2 cup of chicken broth
1/2 c Italian dressing (I use light done right by Kraft)
1/2 an onion rough cut
salt and pepper to taste

I cooked on low for about 6-7 hours and it was DELICIOUS! My DH made a squash casserole and it was more like a dessert. We told Ava it was ice cream and she ate the whole pile on her plate. It seemed like it was time consuming but squash usually is so while this part may not be quick-it was worth it.

Squash Casserole

1 squash, mashed (so peel it, scrape out seeds and boil until fork won't stick & mash)
2-3 eggs beaten
1/2 c milk (we used rice milk)
1/3 c butter (we didn't use this much more like 2 T)
2 T coconut
1/2 t ginger
1/2 t vanilla
1 c sugar (again didn't use this much about a heaping 1/4th c)

Mix all ingredients into mashed squash and spread into small baking dish. Bake at 350 for 1 hour.

It really is dessert like but kid approved!