Vegetarian Enchiladas

I love beans, not the green variety (though I do like them too), but legumes. They are incredibly versatile, nutritious, satisfying and tasty.
I use beans in salads, Indian and Mexican cooking. In Mexican dishes I generally use beans instead of meat.
For this meal I soaked some dried beans over night (kidney beans and another variety which I've forgotten) then boiled and processed some, I left some whole for the texture. I was using an Old El Paso Enchilada meal kit so I mixed through some Mexican spices and half of the tomato based sauce. I filled the tortillas with the bean mix, rolled them, placed them in an oven tray and covered them with the remaining tomato sauce and some cheese, as per the instructions. As a side to the enchiladas I made some guacamole and a salad.
I really enjoyed this meal, however eating lots of beans can tend to have a bad side effect....

Healthy Nachos

I have fond memories of eating nachos when I was younger but they are not something I would happily eat these days. Corn chips, piles of cheese and lashings of sour cream aren't exactly friendly to a girls hips. So I made it my mission to create a low fat version of nachos. I knew they wouldn't be as delicious, but nor would I feel so guilty when eating them.
I toasted pita bread instead using corn chips, had low fat sour cream, a sprinkling of cheese, guacamole, chunky salsa and chilli beans. I used a little Mexican seasoning and a jar of salsa, which I added to, but pretty much the rest was from scratch. I am rather happy with my effort.

And there was just enough left over for lunch. Perfect! Although they were low fat, I have to say I was totally impressed (and so was T).

Chicken with Rice and Beans

I tried something new today, Chicken with Rice and Beans. I came across the recipe on a blog I follow. You can see Cristine's experience with the recipe by following this link. 

 

Chicken with Rice and Beans

• 2 chicken breasts cut into chunky pieces
• 2tspgarlic
• 1tsp ground black pepper
• 1 cup long grain rice
• 1 400g can diced tomatoes
• 3tbs green chilies from a jar
• 1 & 3/4 cups stock
• 1 cup black beans
• generous amount of cheese

Season chicken with garlic and pepper.
Heat oil in a large skillet. Place chicken in the skillet and cook it over medium heat until browned. Remove chicken.
Save any chicken juice, add rice and brown over medium heat for about 2 minutes, stirring constantly.
Add tomatoes, green chilies and stock. Mix well. Place chicken and black beans on top of rice. Bring to the boil. Reduce heat, cover and simmer for about 20 minutes, or until rice is tender and liquid is absorbed.
Sprinkle the cheese on top.

I enjoyed the dish but it wasn't particularly exciting. It definitely needed the cheese to add some flavour. I also needed to serve it with vegies to add nutrition, texture and colour.

This photo was taken before I added cheese

I will try it again but may add some onion, capsicum and other goodies next time.

Vegetarian Mexican

I had every intention of making Mexican Cups (my name for them) or Huevos Rancheros (the magazine's name) but when it came time for dinner I was felling pretty hungry, the kind of hungry that a snack sized dish was not going to satisfy so I stuck with a fail-safe, regular meal and made bean fajitas.

I used a long list of ingredients but the meal was simple and easy to prepare. The ingredients included:

• Multi-grain tortillas 
• Refried bean mix with chilli
• 4 bean mix 
• Mexican spices
• Corn
• Chopped and friend onion
• Capsicum
• Tomatoes
• Avocado
• Brown rice with a little seasoning 
• Salsa sauce

 
It was a nutritious dinner and lunch the following day. Nothing exciting or adventurous but the fajitas made my taste buds happy and filled my tummy.

Fajitas

Tonight's meal was from our favourite Old Al Paso Fajita kit. I've lost count how many times I've made Fajitas this way, they never fail to please.

Today I used refried beans as the main filling, it was time for a vegetarian meal. I also fried some onions, tomato and capsicum with a little coriander.

 
That went into the wrap along with avocado, cheese, lettuce and some salsa.

Tasty, fresh and healthy and enough left for lunch!