Fajita Marinade

Today, or this weekend rather, has been unusually hot here in Orange County. It was hotter today than I think it's been all summer. Anyway, I had to take little brother Jeff to the airport tonight, but promised him I'd make him dinner before we left. So in the heat I wanted to whip up something fast so didn't have to be in the hot kitchen longer than necessary. For me that of course means chicken and rice of some sort, or clean out the fridge fajitas/burritos. Today the fajitas won out. I wanted to do a new seasoning for the fajitas, so I searched out some options on Tasty Kitchen. The first one that came up looked good, so I gave it a try. The actual recipe is supposed to be used for a marinade, but I just made the sauce and poured it on top and cooked it for a while. (I'll link to the actual recipe below and you can try it her way too if you'd like.)

For my fajitas I added a bit of olive oil to a pan and cooked 1 red onion and 1 green pepper until softened. Then I added one can of chicken (did not grocery shop this weekend due to my bronchitis)and some fresh corn from the cob. Mixed up the marinade and poured it over the top and simmered for about 15 minutes. Served up in the ready made, but bake at home tortillas with salsa and sour cream. Huge hit. Brian said the smell was so strong it woke him from his nap, not necessarily a bad thing. Little brother was not only satisfied but impressed with how fast the meal came together. For sure going to use this one in the week night meal rotation. Keeper!

Fajitas Marinade:
2 whole Limes, Juiced
¼ cups Tequila (optional)
¼ cups Olive Oil
¼ cups Chopped Fresh Cilantro Or Parsley
1 Tablespoon Soy Sauce
2 Tablespoons Worcestershire Sauce
2 cloves Garlic, Minced (optional)
½ teaspoons Dried Oregano
1 teaspoon Cumin

Original Recipe on Tasty Kitchen

It's easy burrito night!

I've always loved a good burrito, it's what I look at first on the menu of a Mexican restaurant. My mom use to make us a basic bean and cheese burrito growing up, before our tastes grew up! But even through college and living on my own I always found that I had the ingredients to throw something together. My only complaint was that most of the flavor came from whatever salsa I choose to put on them. That has all changed! This summer, when I was watching Food Network all day, all the time, I caught an episode of Cooking For Real with Sunny Anderson. I'd never seen her show before and had no idea what kind of food she cooked. So I watched the episode and she made these easy, but delicious looking quesadillas with this new jazzed up sour cream. I had pretty much everything needed to make them, so I tried them out that night, and have keep trying out variations at least every other week.

I'm actually not the hugest quesadilla fan because of all the cheese, always conscious of the waist line. So the first time I actually made just the mix and put in a tortilla, and it is relatively low fat. Each time I make the mix I tend to throw in whatever I have in the fridge. Had some left over rice from the night before, so that was new this time. Sunny didn't use chicken, but I think it's a wonderful addition. I've used grilled chicken, or when I'm lazy I'll throw in canned chicken and it is still good. When I don't have red pepper I'll use green, and I've used all kinds of beans. I prefer whole black beans. But yesterday I accidentally opened a can of pinto beans with peppers (I think I also bought that on accident) so I used those just tonight! They were actually a nice little addition.

What I love most about Sunny's recipe is the Cilantro Lime Sour Cream. It is amazing. Again, it's very simple, but just something I never did to my sour cream before. But I am hooked. I like it with a lot of lime juice.

We have been loving those fresh tortillas that you cook yourself. Well, I guess if we keep them frozen they're not really fresh. But we get them at Costco, not the most authentic, but they keep forever. And when we cook them up they taste so fresh. (And for dessert we cooked up a few more and spread some homemade honey butter on them. Delish! Thanks Walburger's!)

Now I know this isn't a super fancy, or even hard recipe. And perhaps most of you have already whipped something like this up. But it's what I was cooking this week. And since I've been hit with round two of a cold, I was lucky to make this!

Southwest Quesadilla Recipe