Short n Savory

Tonight's message is going to be brief. Lots to do. Progress notes (sometimes more aptly named lack-of-progress notes) to write, bills to pay, cluttered house to stare at, oops, I mean pick up. But first, some updates from my kitchen... You'll see two pictures - the one that's not half-eaten (sorry if that looks a little gross - my camera man put pleasure before business the other night and before we realized it, most of his meal was at least partially digested) is (are?) enchiladas, or some take on that wonderful dish. Here's how to make this super fast and mostly healthy, entirely delicious meal:

You'll need: soft corn tortillas (8 or so), a jar of your favorite salsa, frozen or fresh corn, frozen or fresh spinach, mushrooms if you like them, a can of black, refried beans (yes, this exists), any cheese that doesn't clash (I used jack), some cilantro if you have it, may half a white onion, cumin, a can or partial jar of tomatillo salsa (that's the green one - and I think I used about a half-cup) and some sour cream. I almost forgot the secret ingredient. Promise not to cringe - about half a box of condensed soup. Something creamy - I used cream of chicken because I had it. By box I mean one of those small ones - the size of a can of soup. Even Stop n Shop sells an organic brand of condensed soups in boxes - nice to avoid the cans where we, um, can.

You'll need to: Spray a baking dish with some olive oil or other spray, and pour about half the salsa in the bottom of a baking dish. Then chop up what doesn't fit into a reasonably sized enchilada and mix every other ingredient except the sour cream and tortillas. Heat up your tortillas one by one on your gas-top stove, being careful not to catch the tortilla or your hand on fire. (Heating them will help them not fall apart and will also give them better flavor.) After you heat one, and it cools enough to work with it, spoon some of those refried beans and that squishy veggie mixture into the tortilla, roll it up and place it seam-side down in the dish. Repeat until the dish is full, cover with more cheese if you like, and then dump the rest of the salsa on top. Bake at 400 for about 30 minutes. Serve with sour cream and if you really want the full Barafare experience, some of that smokey new Tabasco. No wonder the camera man succumbed.

Next dish: Pork (did I actually just say pork?) tacos. Until this week, I don't think I have ever bought ground pork. Sure, plenty of hot dogs and brats have made it home in my shopping bags, but this week I found a recipe that looked interesting. I made some modifications, but more or less, here is what I did:

Combined in my crock pot 1 meat counter package (average size - how's that for a specific measure) of "premium" (whatever that means, right?) ground pork that I browned a little first on the stove, one link of chopped up Chorizo (it's called something else here in RI but back in CO it's Chorizo - spicy un-Italian sausage) without its casing (I was able to easily peel that away), a half a bag or so of Whole Foods brand hash browns (that I nuked in the micro for like 2 minutes), a decent sized lump of chopped garlic, cumin, a chopped white onion, about a cup of water and some of the cilantro from the other mexicanish meal I made this week. And some dried oregano - maybe a teaspoon. Stirred all that up and let it cook on low for about 5 hours. I added a little water when needed. I served it on soft flour tortillas with some of those leftover refried beans, cheese, and easy corn salsa (corn, lime, cilantro, cumin, garlic, salt, lots of lime). My mouth is actually watering right now thinking about it. I hope yours is too. Enjoy!