Taco... Pasta?

Two food posts in a row... I'm trying to make y'all hungry!

A few months ago, I created a Word document filled with links called "Recipes to Try." Now, when I'm thinking, what should I make for dinner tonight?, I go to that document and see what looks good. 

One recipe that intrigued me to begin with, which is how it got on the list, looked interesting last week.

[Taco Pasta]

Here are the ingredients... I used bow-tie pasta because it's what I had, those are black beans I accidentally opened the other day and didn't use in the tupperware. I skipped the green chiles because I'm a baby. 

Also... I didn't have tomato sauce (or my tomato sauce maker - Jeremy), so I just used one can of diced tomatoes and another of tomato sauce.

Anyway, after browning some ground beef, I threw in the taco seasoning, drained corn and black beans.

Then, I mixed in the diced tomatoes and tomato paste.

And threw it all in some cooked bow-tie pasta.

I spread it around a casserole dish,

covered it in cheese,

added the chips and more cheese... creating nachos on top of my casserole.

I forgot to take a picture of the finished product until we had already dug into it.

We both really liked it... but I agreed with one of the comments on the Tasty Kitchen post. The pasta was just kind of... awkward. It seemed out of place.

Jeremy added sour cream and didn't speak until his plate was clean.

I plan on trying it again soon with rice in the place of pasta. I'll let ya know how that comes out!

Enchiladas

Sorry for the major slow down in blogging... life has been hectic, but in a great way. I started the new job on Thursday, which, other than the commute, has been really great! I stay very busy and the days go by super fast. I'll be working three days a week until May 9th, then I'll be full time.

Anyway... how about some food?!

If you hadn't noticed, we love us some Mexican food down here in Texas. I tried my hand at homemade Enchiladas recently. They turned out a little spicier than I usually prefer, but they were delicious.

My inspiration came from this recipe on Tasty Kitchen, but I adapted it quite a bit with some help from Leslie.

Anyway, I started by seasoning a pound of ground beef with a little Lawry's Taco Seasoning.

Meanwhile, I spread cream cheese over four tortillas (these were some store bought flour tortillas we had in the freezer, next time I'll probably make them).

Once the tortillas and beef were ready, I spread some beef and cheddar cheese onto each tortilla and rolled them up.

In an 8x8, I poured a little enchilada sauce and then put the filled and rolled-up tortillas inside.

I ended up with quite a bit of seasoned beef left over, so I spread that over the enchiladas.

As well as some more enchilada sauce.

Then, lots of cheese. Have I mentioned I love cheese?

I baked them at 375 degrees for about 20 minutes or so.

Like I said, they were really good, but pretty spicy. I'm not sure if it was the enchilada sauce, the taco seasoning or the combination, but there's no way we could eat this when we have Jacob.

Alas, the fiance approved in a big way.

 

Fajitas

Exciting news: I turned in my notice to my apartments yesterday. 

This means so many things. It means I'm moving in less than 60 days. It means I need to figure out where to move. That means I need to figure out where I'm working in order to figure out where to move. 

It is insane to me that I have no idea where I'll be living or working in a matter of two months.

It also means few (no) projects for the next two months since I'll probably get an early start on packing pretty soon. But, I'll be sure to keep everyone posted on my job and home search and, once I move, Adventures in Domestication will be on project overload with a new place!

Anyway, even though there won't be projects, there will be plenty of eating:

At least twice a month, Jeremy and I have Fajita Night. About a year ago, he randomly made fajitas for me once and since then, it's been a biweekly (at least) tradition. Also since then, I have not ordered fajitas from a restaurant once (okay, okay, maybe at Joe T. Garcia's, but that's it!) because the fajitas my boy makes cannot be outdone. 

In my (not so) humble opinion, they are the best fajitas in Texas.

Watch closely, folks. Here's how it's done: 

You begin by cutting up skirt steak, against the grain.

The fajitas pieces slices look a little like this.

Here are the key ingredients: vegetable oil, one lime, liquid smoke and Fiesta Brand taco seasoning for beef tacos (you will see Fiesta Brand fajita seasoning at the grocery store - don't buy that, buy the taco seasoning).

I'm going to give you some suggested measurements, but please only take them as suggestions. Jeremy has never measured before, so these are mere estimates from him. Simply marinate to taste!

<1 pound skirt steak (feeds 2-2.5 people (by half, I mean Jacob))

2 tablespoons vegetable oil

2 teaspoons taco seasoning

7-10 drops liquid smoke

Jeremy cuts the lime in half, sticks a fork inside and turns to get the most juice from the lime.

Once you've got it all in there, it should look a little something like this.

Then, he throws it all together.

He gets the pan really hot, then greases it with vegetable oil. Once the oil is hot, he adds the meat with all of the juices and everything. Cook until brown and serve!

We serve our fajitas with plain black beans and grated cheese (the boy also adds jalapenos, sour cream and salsa).

This is what one of my fajitas looks like: a homemade corn tortilla, baked beans, cheese and fajita meat (I sandwich the cheese between the hot stuff to melt it a little).

This is what Jeremy's tortillas look like: a mess!

Because I don't make this, I'm not going to do the boys' approvals.

Let's just say, I approve these fajitas!

Spaghetti Bolognese

I decided on my way home from work last Friday that I'd like to make something yummy for lunch for Jeremy. He's been working his behind off in school and at work and he's under a lot of pressure with this Europe trip, so I wanted to treat him.

I started flipping through my tagged recipes in my cookbooks and nothing looked too appetizing. I had The Easy-To-Use Beginner's First Cook Book by Bridget Jones open and started flipping through the recipes that weren't tagged [a walk on the wild side].

I started by heating 2 tablespoons of oil in a pan. Once it was hot, I added a chopped up garlic clove (recipe also calls for a finely chopped onion, which I skipped). After cooking that for about five minutes, I added about 1 teaspoon of dried herbs (I estimated on that one) and substitued a few shakes of paprika for the pinch of cayenne pepper.

 Meanwhile, I was also making some beef stock with Better than Bouillon.

 After a few minutes of cooking the herbs in the garlic, I added one pound of ground beef and browned that.

Then, I added a can of diced tomatoes (next time, I will definitely put them in the blender first - was not a fan of those huge tomato chunks), about 3 tablespoons of ketchup, 1 tablespoon of tomato paste, 1 teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce, 1 teaspoon oregano and pepper.

 I mixed all of that together and poured in 1-3/4 cups of beef stock (and skipped the suggestion of 3 tablespoons of red wine).

 Bring this combination to a boil, cover, lower the heat and let simmer for about 30 minutes. While it's simmering, stir occasionally.

 Jeremy and I had crescent rolls with it and it was delicious (despite the huge tomato chunks).

 Jeremy absolutely loved it. He told me it reminded him a lot of the spaghetti his mom used to make when he was growing up.

 Jacob ended up having some leftovers a couple days later. At first glance, he said "I don't think this is good, Vicky." I, of course, told him he would need to try it. After eating 2 noodles and piece of meat, he said "Thank you for this delicious lunch!" I finally convinced him to try the sauce "The sauce isn't bad, Vicky, I like it. I thought it would be spicy, but it's not."

I love that I'm using the stove more often and becoming more comfortable with it! This recipe was far from my comfort zone, and, not only was it very good, but I was even able to eat a few smaller pieces of tomato, which is HUGE for me. 

Chocolate Chip Pancakes

Last weekend, I decided to try out making pancakes. I had literally never made pancakes in my life. Crazy, huh?

 I went through my trusty cookbooks and websites and chose the Buttermilk Pancakes recipe from Better Homes and Gardens, but made the changes for regular pancakes (milk for buttermilk, 1 tablespoon baking powder & no baking soda).

 Once I put the batter into the pan, I added chocolate chips.

This alteration made my boys ridiculously happy!

I'm proud that I'm slowly but surely becoming more comfortable using the stove. I'm also learning through experience why everyone prefers gas stoves, which never made a lot of sense to me before. Now, I really hope my next place has a gas stove!