Saturday, January 5, 2013

Creamy Chicken Tortilla

THE RECIPE
Total time 40 minutes
Yield 8 servings



INGREDIENTS
3 T butter
1 tsp minced garlic
1 md onion, chopped to your liking 
2 T flour
42 oz chicken broth (I used chicken stock)
4 c half and half
(1) 10.75 oz can cream of chicken soup
1cup salsa (your choice on spicy-ness. I use Newman's Own Black Bean & Corn)
4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts, boiled, drained and shredded
(1) 15 oz can kidney beans, drained
(1) 15 oz can black beans, drained
(1) 15 oz can whole kernel corn, drained
2 tsp ground cumin
(1) 1.25 oz packet fajita seasoning
Bag of tortilla chips
(Shredded cheese and sour cream optional)

DIRECTIONS
1. Melt butter in large pot over medium heat. Add garlic and onion, and sautĂ© until softened. 
2.  Add flour and mix well, cooking for about another minute. 
3. Add broth, half and half, cream of chicken soup, salsa, chicken, beans, corn, cumin, and fajita seasoning. Stir together well and simmer on low to medium low heat for 15 minutes. 
4. Crumble the tortilla chips into individual bowls and top with soup. 
5. Serve with shredded cheese and sour cream 




SOME THOUGHTS
  You know how the first thing you learn about reading a recipe is to read the recipe all the way through before you start to actually make the recipe? Yeah, well, I'm really bad at doing that, and it's gotten me into some trouble with more than a few recipes. I didn't read this whole recipe before I started making it, either, but thankfully it didn't mess me up too bad. But, I would recommend cooking your chicken BEFORE you start the rest of the recipe, or you'll have to take your onions off the heat and wait for your chicken to finish.  It's no biggie, but it is a pain in the rear. 
  I hope you'll forgive me, but I'm gonna plug Pampered Chef a couple of times in this post; not because I sell their stuff (I don't), but because I'm in love with some of their stuff.  Plug number one: the deep covered baker. 


  This baby sells for $85.00 and it's worth every penny (that's also really easy for me to say because we received it as a wedding gift).  You can cook a whole chicken in this (in the microwave!) in 30 minutes and cook several chicken breasts in 10 minutes. I love this especially in the summer when I don't want to heat up the entire house by turning in the stove. You might be skeptical hearing that you cook the chicken in microwave, thinking it would be dry and rubbery, but chicken cooked in the deep covered baker comes out extremely moist. When a recipe calls for boiled chicken I always use my baker.  It's so much easier and faster, and it doesn't make the whole house smell like boiled chicken.  

The juices in the baker are all from the chicken itself; I didn't add any water before cooking. 

Look how moist

   The second Pampered Chef plug for today is for their chopper. This thing is so easy to use and breaks apart for easy cleaning. I chopped all of the chicken below (3 breasts) in about a minute. 




  One change I made was using chicken stock instead of chicken broth. This is a substitution that is almost always safe to make and it's almost always a good one. Since I've been making a lot of soups lately, I have noticed a huge flavor difference when I use stock instead of broth. If you're looking for great flavor, do yourself a favor and use stock. 
  Just a couple more pieces of advice about this recipe. First, The directions say to cover the tortilla chips with the soup, but I recommend crumbling the tortilla chips up on top of the soup so they maintain some of their crunch. I think it's better that way.  And second, this recipe has a lot of sodium-laden ingredients so I recommend going with as many low sodium options as you can, especially if you are going to permanently add it to your recipe book. 

THE VERDICT
  We absolutely loved this soup! It was nice to have a soup with meat in it after several nights of veggie only soups. This was a very filling soup that was just loaded with yummy favors. We will definitely be adding this to our regular recipes!

Enjoy!




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