Slow Cooker Black Bean Enchiladas

This recipe from the kitchn came with so many caveats about how these are not your ordinary baked enchiladas, and how they end up being a gooey mess but they’re still good, that it was almost worth making them just to see if they lived up to all the anti-hype. They’re easy, they’re tasty – they’re messy and not crispy at all. And still good. So give them a try.

They are a great way to use up weird leftover bits of things. This is what tofu does when you freeze it. People like to freeze it because it goes crumbly, so we tried it as an experiment after making stir fry one night.

Start by chopping up 1 small onion. Dice up 1 red bell pepper. Drain and rinse 1 16oz can of black beans. Divvy out 1 cup frozen corn. Mix all those together in a bowl. Grate up 1-2 cups good melting cheese, and add in 1/2 cup of that cheese to the bowl.

Mix together as well some spices: 2 teaspoons chili powder, 1 teaspoon cumin and 1 teaspoon kosher salt. I find often that this sort of food genre is benefitted by adding in 1 teaspoon cinnamon as well.

Tip that into the mixed veg.

Add in any leftover ground meat or chicken you have, if you have any, or this weird crumbled spongy thawed tofu. I really felt like I was breaking up a sponge. Later, I felt like I was EATING a sponge.

In the bottom of a 4-6 quart slow cooker, spread enough of a 30oz jar of salsa to coat the bottom. You’ll note here that we have a very bowl-shaped slow-cooker. This probably works a bit better in a more flat-bottomed version.

Ker-SPLAT.

Grab a package of flour tortillas (ours were the small size, pack of 10). Scoop about 1/3 cup of that vegetable filling into each tortilla, roll it up, and lay it seam-side-down in the slow cooker.

Once you’ve got a layer (with our shape of bowl, that didn’t take long), sprinkle with more salsa and some more of the cheese.

You should probably end up with only two layers but because of the shape of our bowl we had three, so it was a good thing I grated more cheese. Any extra filling can be piled on top.

Then add in the rest of the jar of salsa. Resist adding on the rest of the cheese – keep about 1/2 cup of it back for the end bit.

Cook on high for 2-4 hours (or on low for 8 hours if you’re prepared for extra mushy enchiladas). In the last 15 minutes of cooking, take the last 1/2 cup of cheese and sprinkle that over top, close the lid, and let it melt.

Serve with sour cream, guacamole, and cilantro, or whatever else floats your enchilada boat!

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Chipotle Beans (and Rice!)

This probably should be a Wingin’ it Wednesday kind of post but it’s so good I simply can’t wait that long. This came out of the fact that I had been remiss in cleaning our refrigerator and there were some sad looking contents that really needed to be dealt with.

It also makes for a super quick dinner because most of the ingredients just need to be heated up and then you’re set.

Start by cooking up (or heating up) some rice. I’m using brown rice here because that’s the sum total of rice I had in my house but you can use whatever you want.

Then I chopped some stuff: onions, green onions …

Some cold Italian sausages we’d barbecued the night before …

And some very sorry-looking tomatoes.

Then I drained and rinsed a can of black beans. You can use any kind of bean you like – just make sure they’re not dried or that would taste bad.

Then I heated up some oil and butter in my big cast iron skillet and cooked the onions until they were translucent and smelled amazing.

Added in some garlic and the beans and gave that a stir.

Then I chucked in the rest of the stuff.

Added a wee sprinkling of ground chipotle.

And a few dollops of sweet salsa (this stuff has mangos in it and I love it).

Then I stirred it all around until everything was soft and amazing.

And then served it over rice with a dollop of sour cream.

The cilantro garnish is growing on my table. I hope it will flourish in the backyard once it gets warmer.

This was so good I don’t want to wait until I clean the fridge again to make it once more!

Three Bean Mexi Salad

This is a quick and colourful summery salad you can serve at any time, as a side dish and as a standalone meal. It’s easy and appetizing and full of flavour. And, as it’s Labour Day, you should take a break, and enjoy this simple salad.

Start with your beans. Crack open a can each of black beans, red kidney beans, and white navy beans. Or whatever beans you like, really.  Drain them and give them a rinse in a colander. Set that aside while you chop up some veg.

Chop up 2 red peppers into whatever size you think is appropriate for a bean salad.  Who am I to tell you what to do?

Do the same with 2 jalapeños.  Be careful not to touch your eyes while you’re doing this.  I like to mince mine up super fine.

Chop up as well 1 red onion.

And slice up about 4 green onions.

Huck all those things in a bowl with your beans, and add to that about 1 1/2 cups frozen corn kernels.

For the dressing, start by mincing up a huge bunch of fresh cilantro.

Drop that in a bowl with a few cloves minced garlic and the juice and zest of 1 lime.

Add to that 2 tablespoons granulated sugar, a dash of salt and pepper, another dash of hot pepper sauce, and 1 tablespoon ground cumin.

Mix that all together, then add in 1/2 cup olive oil and 1/2 cup red wine vinegar.

Dump that on top of your salad and toss until well combined.

This salad is best if you cover it and leave it in the fridge overnight to let the flavours mingle.  Serve it cold.

Life-Changing Burritos

I know.  We just had a burrito post recently.  But when we were in Portland, and I was busy doing wedding related things with Doodle and the other bridesmaids, the Pie was often left to his own devices.  Luckily, Portland is a very walkable city, and there was a good Street Fighter tournament on the web for him to watch when he got bored with walking about.  One afternoon, he happened upon a place called the Burrito Bar.  The burrito he had there, according to him, changed his life forever.  So last week, he recreated what he had eaten there and I got to enjoy it as well. Plus, we had to do something about our raging onion population.

First, he started by making up a batch of his famous Mexican rice.

While he was doing that he gently poached 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts.

Then he put me to work as his sous-chef.  I had to make the “salad” component.  First, I opened up an avocado.

Then I cubed it.

Then I found a tomato.

And cubed that as well.

Chopped up a handful of cilantro and added that in, as well as some salt and pepper and lime juice.

Toss that and set it aside.

Open up a can of black beans and drain and rinse them well.

Then he had me finely chop a jalapeno pepper, to go in his cheese sauce.

The cheese sauce is made by melting a tablespoon butter with a tablespoon flour to form a paste, then adding a half cup of milk.  When that is well-mixed you can add your grated cheese, about 1 1/2 cups.  The Pie used a mixture of old cheddar and spicy Monterey jack.

Once the cheese was melted he dropped in the jalapenos and let that sit for a bit.

At this point the chicken was ready to be shredded. Just pull it apart with some forks. It’s pretty fun.

We added a few tablespoons salsa to the chicken.

So now we are ready to make these burritos, baby.  We have Mexican rice, salad, salsa-y chicken, black beans, cheese sauce, and some sour cream as well.

You’re going to need the biggest flour tortillas you can find.  These ones are ten inches, though the Pie says the one he had in Portland was THIRTEEN inches.  Set your tortillas on a sheet of aluminum foil.

Start piling on your ingredients in the centre of your tortilla.  Be generous.

To properly fold a burrito, we looked to the internet.  If you’re not sure, try YouTube.

Take the opposite side of your tortilla and bring it towards you, so the ingredients get all jumbled together and pushed to one side. This also leaves a bit of food sauce on the empty side of the tortilla, which provides a bit of friction to keep things stuck together.

Unfold the tortilla and lift up the sides, to sort of hold everything in. Take the side of the tortilla closest to you, with all the ingredients, and flip it up and over on itself.

Then, tucking in the top of the tortilla, start rolling towards the end.  Try to get it as tight as possible.

Make sure your ends are tucked in and slide the rolled tortilla to one side of your aluminum foil.

Tightly roll the burrito up in the foil, and twist off the ends when you are finished, to hold everything together.  That is your burrito, all wrapped up.  We had enough ingredients to make seven of these puppies, and we tossed a few in the fridge for a later meal, and a few in the oven for about ten minutes to heat up a bit.

To eat, just peel off some of the foil and you are all set. Take a bite.

This is one of the burritos the next day, cut in half.  Look at that lovely combination of ingredients!

Chicken and Black Bean Burritos

I got this recipe from Canadian Living, but I would say it’s more of a cross between an enchilada and a burrito than it is a full-on burrito, especially after my modifications.  You tend not to bake burritos and there are lots of refried beans involved.  In any case, it’s easy, it’s quick, and it’s hella tasty.  It makes about 10 6″ wraps.

Start with 3 large chicken breasts, still on the bone, and poach them in gently simmering water until cooked, about 15-25 minutes.

Then shred the meat with forks, in good southern style.  Set that aside.

Dice a large onion and plop that in a wide frying pan with some olive oil and minced garlic and sauté those suckers until they are tender and translucent.

Chop up as well a red pepper and a jalapeño pepper.

Drain and rinse a can of black beans.

Wrangle yourself 1 cup salsa.  I say “wrangle” because that’s what I did with this — it was in three different jars as I was cleaning out the fridge.

Toss the peppers, beans, and salsa into the pan with the onions, and add the chicken as well.

Stir everything around to coat with salsa — I found I needed to add a little bit extra to get it all covered.  Season with salt and pepper.

Grate up about 2 1/2 cups cheddar cheese and set that aside for a bit.

In a greased dish or on a sheet of aluminum foil, lay out a flour tortilla.  You can use any kind you want, but I used the small whole wheat ones, just to make this a bit healthier.  Spoon in a generous amount of filling (you will likely have a bit left over so don’t be afraid to go overboard).

Sprinkle the filling with a bit of cheddar cheese.

Roll the wrap into a cylinder and place it in your dish or on the foil with the open side down.

Repeat with the other wraps until you run out.  Sprinkle the remainder of the cheddar across the tops of the burritos.

Bake at 400°F for 15 minutes, until the cheese is melted and bubbly and the wraps turn golden brown.  Or wrap tightly in foil and freeze.  You can bake these from frozen, just increase the cooking time to 25 minutes.

Serve them with sour cream and chopped green onions.