Toe in the Kitchen Tuesday

Title: Chicken Tortilla Soup

Tried it: This has been a family favorite for over three years now.

Source: Some magazine--Mom cut it out and we cooked it first on our speical dinner day for mom. original the recipe was for 20 servings-- below is a fourth of that (still enough for a family of four, seconds, and leftovers)

Easiness: 3 stars. I buy rosettary chicken already cooked. Half the items (the corn, broth, green chiles, black beans, and tomatoes) come from cans. Onions and garlic both need to be perpared (though this is easier if you mince the garlic in a garlic press and cut the onion in discs and chop up with a food chopper).

Rating: 5 out 5. One of my favorite dishes and the leftovers taste as good as the first night.

1 Tablespoon of Olive Oil

1 medium size onion cut into meidum dice

2 large garlic cloves, minced

2 teaspoons of chili powder

1 teaspoon dried oregano

1 28 ounced can crushed tomatoes

1 pint of chicken broth

1/2 16 ounce package of frozen corn

4 ounce green chilies chopped

15.5 ounce can of black beans

2 cups of shredded, cooked chicken

1/2 cup chopped fresh cilantro (optional)



Heat oil in large soup kettle over med/high heat.

Add onions and saute' until tender (4 minutes)

Add garlic cloves, chili powder and oregano, saute' 1 minute longer.

Add tomatoes, broth, corn, chilies, beans and chicken.

Bring to a simmer.

reduce heat and simmer, partically covered to belnd flavors, about 20 minutes

Stir in cilantro

serve warm with tortilla chips

Toe in the Kitchen Tuesday

Title: Chicken Mozzarella
Tried it:1/22/11
Source: Campbell Casseroles: Great for Cooking
Easiness(out of five starts: 5-the only way to make this more easy is not baking at all)
Rating (out of five stars): 4 stars on taste
Full time: 25 minutes

4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
1 can (10 3/4 oz.) Campbell's Condensed Tomato Soup
1/2 teaspoon Italian seasoning or dried oregano leaves, crushed
1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
1/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
3 cups corkscrew-shaped pasta (rotini), cooked without salt and drained

1. Place the chicken in a 11x8 inch shallow baking dish. Stir the soup, Italian seasoning and garlic powder in a small bowl. Spoon the soup mixture over the chicken.
2. Bake a 400*F for 20 minutes or until the chicken is cooked through.
3. Sprinkle the cheese over the chicken. serve with the pasta.

Review: Like all the recipes in this book, the Chicken Mozzarella had three steps and less than seven items. This makes this the ideal type of book for beginning cooks. Also, the recipes do have the 'out of the can/out of the bag' approach to cooking, which makes it less time consuming and simple. Since I'm not a huge fan of tomato soup in general I was expecting this to be less than great. But doctoring it up with a little bit of spice and the garlic powder, really picked it up. I think I made way too much pasta for the amount of sauce we had... I am not even included it the next time I make this. Mom also enjoyed it.

Blueberry Coffee Cake

Source of recipe: Recipes: Douglas Public Library District recipe's name: Shelia's Blueberry Coffee Cake submitted by Joyce Rovetta

Food course: breakfast or bread

Quantity: 2 9 inch pans worth (16 pieces if your cutting the traditional 8 pieces per pie).

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/2 cups + 2 T sugar

2 1/2 tsp. baking powder

3/4 tsp. salt

1/4 cup vegetable oil

3/4 cup milk

1 egg

2 cup well drained blueberries, canned, frozen or fresh (i found that frozen berries do better in this recipe than fresh)

Topping:

1/3 cup flour

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 cup soft butter

1/2 cup sugar

Blend all ingredients except blueberries and tipping in mixer. beat vigorously about 1 minute. Carefully stir in blueberries. pour into greased, 9-inch, large cake pan or 8x8 inch or 9X9 inch square pan.

mix lightly the topping ingredients. sprinkle topping over batter. back in preheated 375 degree oven about 30 minutes or until it passes the toothpick test.

Some side notes about this dish: first of all this dish does wonderful in the freezer so feel free to make the whole recipe and place one of the pans in the freezer for next Sunday's breakfast. If you don't have a mixer (which I don't) feel free to mix it by hand the results will not be affected by the smoothness of the batter. You may find this recipe needs a little extra flour in the batter if you're at a higher altitude; however, I ended up adding more milk to counter the extra flour I up it so play it by ear. also, the batter is not going to be like cake mix batter. It will be thicker; and when I tested it out for myself, it was cookie dough consistence-- and the end taste/texture was still perfect.

Jalapeno Poppers

Source of recipe: Former Boss Deb

Food course: Appetizer

Quantity: if you follow the amount on the recipe 40 units; however, the recipe is an easy one to change the amounts on to the amount you need/want.

20 Jalapenos
1 container (8oz) of Regular (or low fat) Philadelphia Cream Cheese
a packaged of bacon (around 20 pieces)
toothpicks



Preparing Jalapenos:

• Rinse jalapenos
  
• Cut of tops


• Half jalapenos.


• Scoop out ribs and seeds
  

The seeds and ribs are what give the jalapenos the heat-- so if you want a little kick to this recipe, leave some of the ribs in and mix the seeds into the cream cheese. Also, jalapenos juices are very irritable to the skin. either make sure you don't touch the seeds and ribs when removing OR wear plastic gloves (or if you're like me, use plastic sandwich on you hands.)

• Scoop cream cheese into each half jalapeno.
• Cut the bacon strips in half.

Take bacon strip and wrap around cream cheese filled jalapeno and secure with toothpick.

Repeat steps for all jalapenos.

• Place all jalapenos on a cookie sheet (the bacon with left off grease so a cookie sheet with a lip would be best)
• Preheat oven to 350*
• Bake for 20 minutes or until bacon is brown and crispy.

For best result on carrying/reheating: place paper towels on the bottom of a microwavable bowl. When you microwave these they bacon will sweat of some more grease and the paper towels absorbs (if you don't have them in the container, the bottom poppers will be bathing in a pool of extra grease.) After letting the jalapenos cool, stack them on top of each other in bowl. Put in refrigerator until you need to reheat. place in microwave for 3 minutes on high, or until you hear the bacon sizzle and poppers are warm to the touch.