Stove Top Taco Pasta

(Photo is not particularly attractive , but I can guarantee, it tastes better than it looks)

I love Mexican food. OK, maybe not real Mexican food but the kind that most Americans grow up with. You know what I am talking about; tacos, fajitas, tortilla chips with salsa. I also love pasta. Mac and cheese, pesto with fusilli, creamy tomato with penne. Yum.

So it only figures that I am a huge fan of this dish - Stove Top Taco Pasta. It is a spin off of the Taco Bake which requires baking in the oven and takes much longer to prepare. This version is so easy and with only 5 ingredients, pulls together quickly for a filling meal.

I hope you like it as much as we do.

Stove Top Taco Pasta
(Source: Variation of the Taco Bake)
Ingredients
1 lb ground beef
1/4 c taco seasoning
3/4 c water
1 pkg low fat cream cheese (8 oz)
1 box pasta (we used medium shells)
optional: cheese of your choice to sprinkle on top (we used mozzarella since that is all we had)

Directions
Brown ground beef in a large dutch oven.
Combine taco seasoning and water.
Pour taco seasoned water over browned meat, stirring to ensure all meat is covered.
Simmer to reduce amount of liquid (approximately 5-10 minutes) on low.
Once reduced, add cubed cream cheese, stirring to incorporate fully.
Prepare pasta according to directions and drain.
Add drained pasta to dutch oven, stirring to coat completely.

Creamy Chicken Enchiladas

There are a number of creamy chicken enchilada recipes floating around the Internet. Having never made enchiladas before but having all the seemingly necessary ingredients in my pantry, I cobbled together my own recipe.

Before I go any further, I have to tell you Mr. Gooch was so impressed that I had made a dish with such heat and flavor. You see, when we first started dating, heat and/or spicy were not really in my repertoire. To be honest, I was pretty close to the queen of bland. My idea of spicy was using Italian dressing as a marinade on a salmon fillet. And any heat was to be avoided. Yeah, it was that bad. But Mr. Gooch began to rub off on me. Starting with the Barbacoa beef burritos from Chipotle and moving onto spicy marinades for various meats. Apparently, hanging out with my hubby has opened my food horizons. Of course, living within 1.5 miles of a Penzeys doesn't hurt either.

Now back to the recipe review, I was nervous since this was my first enchilada attempt but the results were very very good. So good that we both has second helpings. As written below, the heat in the mouth factor may be considered by some to be quite high. This was especially pronounced since we did not eat it with any rice. To lessen the heat, you can remove the seeds from the chilies before you mince them.

Creamy Chipotle Enchiladas
(Source: the depths of my brain and about 50 different recipes found scattered around the Internet)
Ingredients
2 large cooked and shredded chicken breasts (approximately 3 cups)
10 taco size tortillas
1 jar enchilada sauce
2 chipotle peppers, minced and 1 tablespoon adobo sauce from a can
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
1/2 red onion chopped fine
1 green pepper chipped fine
1 Tablespoon olive oil
8 oz low fat cream cheese, cubed

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
In a large skillet, heat olive oil and sweat onions and green peppers.
Add adobo sauce and chipotle peppers.
Saute for another 3-5 minutes.
Add cubed cream cheese.
Stirring frequently until melted.
Add shredded chicken.
Mix thoroughly and remove from heat.
Fill tortillas with chicken mixture, roll and place seam side down in a 9x13 nonstick pan. (I was able to fit them in a 2 x 5 configuration.)
Once pan is filled, cover with enchilada sauce.
Sprinkle cheese on top of sauce.
Cover with foil and bake 20 minutes.
Remove foil and bake another 20 minutes.
Let sit covered for 10 minutes before serving.

Tex-Mex Baked Chicken

I saw this recipe on foodnetwork.com and knew there had to be a way that I could make this work without the frying.

So I checked out our pantry and put together the recipe below. It was a bit "hot" but the rice we served it with, helped even that out.

We will definitely be making this one again. (Please note: This dish is much tastier than the photo makes it out to be.)

Tex-Mex Baked Chicken
Adapted from Tex-Mex Chicken Crunchies

Ingredients
3/4 cup mixture bread crumb and Panko
1/2 cup Chipotle sauce
1/4 cup Taco Sauce
2 large skinned and boned chicken breast halves, cut into 1 inch wide strips
1/cup cheddar cheese

Directions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Whisk together taco sauce and Chipotle sauce in a small bowl.
Stir together bread crumbs and Panko in a separate shallow dish.
Dredge chicken pieces in sauce mixture and dredge in crumb mixture.
Place covered chicken pieces in baking dish.
Drizzle with remaining sauce.
Mix cheese and breadcrumbs and cover chicken.
Cover the dish with aluminum foil and place in oven.
Bake for 20 minutes or until chicken is cooked completely.

Mexican Taco Shells

Why is it that the most tasty meals photography so unattractively? I suppose it is just one of those mysteries of the world. This is one of those situations. The dish doesn't photograph well, but it is so good.

After seeing the recipe for this dish on Get in My Belly, I knew Mr. Gooch and I would need to have it for dinner. We both love Mexican spices, pasta and cheese. This dish combines all three so how could we go wrong?

It was as good as we thought it would be. This is definitely going to be added to the dinner rotation.

Mexican Taco Shells
Source: Get in My Belly

Ingredients
1 lb. ground beef
1 package taco seasoning
4 oz. cream cheese (we used low-fat)
12 jumbo pasta shells (we used a lot so we could fill the whole pan)
1 cup salsa
1 cup taco sauce
1 cup cheddar cheese
1 cup Monterrey jack cheese (We used mozzarella cheese)
1 1/2 cups crushed tortilla chips
3 green onions (omitted because I didn't have any)
Sour cream

Directions
1. In a frying pan cook ground beef; add taco seasoning and prepare according to package directions.
2. Add cream cheese, cover and simmer until cheese is melted. Blend well. Set aside and cool completely.
3. While ground beef is cooking, cook the pasta shells according to directions; drain. Set shells out individually on cutting board/baking sheet so that they don't stick together.
4. Pour salsa on bottom of 9x13 baking dish.
5. Stuff each shell with the meat mixture. Place shells in 9x13 pan open side up. Cover shells with taco sauce.
6. Cover with foil and bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees.
7. After 30 minutes, add shredded cheese and bake for 10-15 more minutes.
8. Add any condiments you'd like (onions, black olives, etc.) Serve with sour cream and/or more salsa. Enjoy!

Chipotle's Barbacoa Beef - Or at Least a Close Approximation

I love Chipotle's Barbacoa Beef Burrito. I love it so much that for a long time Mr. Gooch and I had "Chipotle Wednesday." Translation: we would have Chipotle for dinner every Wednesday (with leftovers for lunch the next day). On many occasion, just knowing CW was coming helped me get through the early days of the week.

Since I am trying to do more cooking at home, I Googled "Chipotle Barbacoa Beef" to see if I could find the recipe. I found one that proclaimed to be the official recipe but it looked way more complicated and had a number of ingredients I would need to purchase (I mean don't we all have packets of avocado leaves in the pantry) so I continued to search.

I then found the recipe below. Simple, without complicated ingredients, and didn't require me to have my oven on for 7+ hours. In other words, my kind of recipe!

Result: This recipe was close but not exact. The taste and texture were a bit different, not as spicy and much moister. Not much I could so about the moistness but I did add Chipotle Tabasco to my burrito to spice it up a bit.

Chipotle Barbacoa Chuck Roast
From recipezaar.com

Ingredients
1 (2 lb) chuck roast
2 (2 ounce) packets seasoning (Ortega Chipotle Taco Season)
2 tablespoons cooking oil (I used Olive Oil)
2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar
1 dash hot sauce
2 cups water (enough to barely cover roast)

Directions
I have a 2 pound roast so the directions will vary due to weight. (1 packet of seasoning per pound, 1 TBS of cooking oil per pound, 1 TBS of apple cider vinegar per pound).

I put 2 cups of water in my crock pot and put the 2 packets of Ortega chipotle taco seasoning in and wisked. Then I added 2 TBS of cooking oil, 2 TBS of apple cider vinegar, and a dash of hot sauce and wisked again.

I placed the roast into a large skillet and seared both sides then placed in crock pot. (I skipped this step to save time.)

Set the crock pot to low setting and let it slow cook for at least 8 hours on low. Remove meat from crock pot and shredded with fork on cutting board and placed in serving dish. Cook time I would say 8 hours minimum on a low setting and less time for higher settings. (I did 2 hours on high and 4 hours on low)

We served with Le Tortilla Factory low-carb tortillas, lettuce, shredded cheese, cilantro basmati rice (click here for recipe), black beans and sour cream.

These were delicious and pretty darn close to the real deal. Depending on what size tortillas you use and how much meat you put into them determines how many servings this will make.

Chipotle Basmati Rice - Can't Have Burritos Without It

So with the Barbacoa Beef recipe in hand, I went in search of a recipe for the Chipotle Rice recipe. I knew that they had to use a particular type of rice since it had a different texture than I made at home. I knew that there was also some cilantro and lime. What else, I just wasn't sure.

But then I found this recipe. Score! So I gathered all the ingredients (including getting some basmati rice from the local grocery) and got ready to make this necessary (and tasty) ingredient in a good burrito.

The only problem was the fact that it didn't outline when to add the cilantro to the recipe. I added it after the rice was cooked with some additional salt and lime juice.

See my edits/changes to the recipe in italics.

Chipotle's Basmati Rice Recipe
The source of this recipe is attributed to Chipolte's Executive Chef (and CEO), Steve Ellis

Ingredients
1 teaspoon vegetable oil or butter (I used unsalted butter)
2 tsp. fresh cilantro (I used about 1 tsp. dehydrated cilantro)
2/3 cup white basmati rice
1 cup water
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 Lime (1 tsp. added to the butter plus extra to sprinkle on the cooked rice)

Directions
In a 2-quart heavy saucepan, heat oil or butter over low heat, stirring occasionally until melted.

Add rice and lime juice, stir for 1 minute.

Add water and salt, bring to a full rolling boil.

At boiling, cover, turn down to simmer over low heat until rice is tender and the water is absorbed, about 25 minutes.

Fluff rice with a fork.

Bauck Bauck - Chicken Quesedillas

I love the chicken quesedilla. I love it's cheesy goodness, the crispiness of the tortilla, the spiciness of the chicken, all of it is so good.

But like the snake in Eden, all is not good is the garden of quesedillas. Tortillas are high in fat, cheese is high in fat, all in all not a very low-cal meal. But I was determined to make a lower fat version at home.

First, find a tortilla that was not so full of the bad stuff. Check. I found La Tortilla Factory tortillas that are actually 0 points due to the low cal, high fiber, low fat numbers.

Second, get a tasty cheese. I found a low fat finely shredded co-jack. The fine shred lets you get better coverage with less. 1/3 cup is 2 points.

Third, the chicken. I boiled and shredded skinless chicken breasts. The lowest cal way I could think of. To give it some kick in the quesedilla, I seasoned the meat with taco seasoning and a few drops of Chipotle Tabasco. 3 oz. of chicken is 3 points.

Seasonings and accouterments were low/no cal as well. Chipotle Tabasco, Taco Sauce, low fat sour cream (for Mr. Gooch).

The final product was pretty darn tasty. And they look pretty darn good too. I used another pan to press the tortillas together on the grilled, helping to really bring ot the grill marks.

The best part was when I did the math and figured that our entire dinner was 11 points. That included a large salad, the chicken quesedilla and small serving of spanish rice.

Variation on a (Taco Bake) Theme

Raves for the Taco Bake recipe has been floating around the What's Cooking board for a long time now. We made our own variation on the recipe based on the original found on Lindsay's Love Deliciousness blog and what we had in our cupboard. It was creamy and delicious and will definitely be added to the dinner rotation for the future.



The original recipe called for baking in a 9 x 13 inch pan. This was too large for just the two of us, so I split the recipe into two 8x8 inch pans. One for tonight and one for a future dinner.


The Taco Bake Variation


Ingredients
1 lb ground turkey
3 heaping tablespoons of homemade taco seasoning (from The Complete Tightwad Gazette)
16 oz. spaghetti sauce
8 oz. fusilli pasta
8 oz. package fat free cream cheese, softened in microwave
1/2 cup sour cream
8 oz. shredded co-jack cheese


Directions
Brown ground turkey, drain if necessary.
Add taco seasoning and tomato sauce.
Bring to a boil and then simmer for 20 minutes.
In the meantime, cook pasta according to directions. Drain.
Mix softened cream cheese and sour cream in separate bowl.
Spray bottoms of two 8x8 pans.
Put pasta in bottom of pans.
Spread cream cheese mixture over pasta.
Spoon ground meat mixture over this.
Sprinkle shredded cheese on top.
Bake one pan @ 350 degrees for 30 minutes.
Let cool 15 minutes before serving.


Cover the other pan with plastic wrap and aluminum foil.
Place in freezer for another night's dinner.
Remover from freezer and let thaw.
Bake per instructions above.