Crock Pot Mexican Chicken

I love using my crock pot to fix meals when I have to feed my family members at different times.  This particular dish is super easy to assemble, because there is no browning, or chopping required in getting this meal started.  This is also a good meal to make if you're on a tight budget.

I always like to give credit for the source of the recipes I make, but in this case, I don't have any idea where I got this one.  I think someone shared it with me, so if you recognize this as a recipe you gave me, let me know and I'll add your name to this post!  This dish gets all 8's on the Melnarik rating scale.

I begin by placing the chicken in my crock pot.  The recipe calls for boneless, skinless chicken breasts, but I used chicken tenders this time, because they were on sale!  Helpful tip:  When using a slow cooker, always put cold or room temperature foods in a cool crock pot, and if they are warm (browned meat, etc.) put them in a pre-warmed crock pot.  It takes a little while for the crock pot to come up to full temperature, so this helps ensure that the food cooks well from the beginning of the cooking time, and helps avoid bacteria from beginning to grow.

Directly on top of the chicken, I add the frozen corn (no need to defrost), the black beans which I drain and rinse, the canned tomatoes, as well as the seasonings (chili powder, cumin, oregano, cayenne pepper, salt, pepper, and minced garlic).  I place the lid on the crock pot and turn it on low for 8 hours.  If you don't have that much cooking time, it can be cooked on high for 4 hours.

About half an hour before the end of the cooking time, I cook 3 cups of white rice according to the package directions.  At the end of the cooking time, I remove the chicken and, using two forks, shred it and return it to the crock pot.  I thoroughly mix it into the vegetables and replace the lid to keep it warm while I shred some cheese and chop some cilantro.

To plate this dish, I put some white rice on the bottom, then add the Mexican chicken.  I top that with some shredded cheddar cheese and some chopped cilantro.  It's nice to come home to a dinner that needs very little attention to get it on the table!  Enjoy!

Crock Pot Mexican Chicken

1 ½ pounds boneless, skinless chicken breasts

1 (16 oz.) jar salsa

1 (15 oz.) can black beans, drained

½ pound (8 oz.) frozen corn

1 tablespoon chili powder

1 ½ teaspoons cumin

1 ½ teaspoons minced garlic

½ teaspoon dried oregano

¼ teaspoon cayenne pepper

¼ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon pepper

2 cups dry rice

8 oz. cheddar cheese, shredded

½ bunch cilantro, optional

Place chicken in a cool crock pot.  Add salsa, black beans and corn, making sure the chicken is covered.  Sprinkle chili powder, cumin, minced garlic, oregano, cayenne, salt and pepper on top.  Cover and cook on low for 8 hours or on high for 4 hours.  About ½ hour before the end of the cooking time, prepare rice according to package directions.  When fully cooked, remove chicken from crock pot and shred with 2 forks.  Stir back into ingredients in crock pot.  Serve over hot rice, adding shredded cheese and chopped cilantro to the top.

Shredded Beef Nachos (Crock Pot)

This is a great dish to serve a bunch of hungry teenagers; I know from experience.  It's also great for those times when I know I'll be gone all day and won't have much time to prepare a meal, plus everyone seems to be eating at different times.  I usually serve it as a meal and the leftovers are used by my boys as a snack later in the week.

I think boys like almost anything that can be eaten with their fingers!  That and the crunch of the chips makes this a winner with my guys.  I found this recipe in slow cooker recipe book at the check out counter in the market and I love that there is so little work involved in preparing this dish.  That made it a perfect choice during the busy holidays!  My guys give this recipe 8's and 9's on the Melnarik rating scale.

After trimming the chuck roast of any extra fat around the outside, I place it in a cool crock pot.  Tip:  Only hot foods should be placed in a heated crock pot, cold or room temperature foods should be placed in a cool crock pot before cooking.

I added the minced garlic to the top of the roast and distributed it as evenly as possible.

In a small bowl, I combined the taco seasoning mix and brown sugar.  I always use dark brown sugar unless a recipe specifies otherwise.

This mixture was then sprinkled over the beef.  I covered the crock pot and cooked it on low for 8 hours.  If time is an issue, it can also be cooked on high for 4 - 5 hours.

Once fully cooked, the roast had shrunk a bit and there was a flavorful sauce at the bottom of the pot.

The meat was so tender, I had to remove it from the crock pot in sections.  I placed it on a cutting board and shredded it using 2 forks, discarding any fat.

The shredded beef was returned to the crock pot and mixed in with the juices.  That's all it took and it was ready to serve.  This is how we assemble our nachos:

We place tortilla chips on a microwave safe plate and, using a slotted spoon, top them with some of the shredded beef (left).

We top the beef with a pre-shredded Mexican cheese blend -Monterey Jack and cheddar (right).

We put the plate in the microwave for 1 minute on high to melt the cheese (left).


Then we add any desired toppings such as salsa, sour cream, cilantro,
green onions, and/or fresh tomatoes (right).

These nachos can be served as a snack or as a meal.  Any way you serve them, they're sure to be a hit!  Enjoy!

Shredded Beef Nachos

Nachos

1 (3 lb.) boneless beef chuck roast, trimmed of fat

2 garlic cloves, minced

1 pkg. Taco seasoning mix

3 tablespoons brown sugar

Tortilla chips

Suggested Toppings:

Cheddar/Monterey Jack cheese, shredded

Sour cream

Salsa

Green onion

Olives

Cilantro

Diced tomatoes

Place beef roast in a 3 ½ or 4 quart slow cooker.   Distribute garlic evenly over beef.  In a small bowl, mix together taco seasoning and brown sugar; sprinkle over roast.  Cover and cook on low 8 – 9 hours.

Before serving, place topping ingredients in individual serving dishes.  Remove beef from slow cooker; place on a large plate or cutting board.  Shred beef with 2 forks; return to slow cooker and mix well.

To serve, have guests place chips on serving plates; using tongs or a slotted spoon top chips with shredded beef.  Top the beef with cheese and any other desired toppings.

Beef mixture can be held on low setting for up to 2 hours.

Liza's Holiday Meal Helpful Tips

 Every year, just before Thanksgiving, I share these extremely helpful tips with almost everyone I encounter!  These ideas save room in your oven and have other appealing reasons for putting them into practice.  The main key is to have crock pots available.  Yes, I have more than one crock pot (different sizes for different uses), but if you have only one, then either use your favorite tip listed below or borrow a slow cooker from a relative, neighbor, or friend!  You'll be glad you did!

I love my hot foods hot and my cold foods cold when I eat them.  Mashed potatoes cool down very quickly once set on the table in a serving bowl.  To avoid eating cooled spuds, I utilize one of my crock pots.  I use a serving bowl that will serve everyone at the table, then when it's time for seconds (we all know that happens, especially at the holidays), I refill the bowl with steaming mashed potatoes!  The other benefit to this is that I can make the potatoes earlier in the day, wash and put away my pot, etc. and keep the spuds hot in the crock pot, freeing up space on top of the stove.  They will keep nicely on the low setting for at least 1 1/2 hours.  They may get a little crusty around the sides after that amount of time, but it's so worth it.  If I really have my act together, I will prepare the potatoes the day before, put them in the crock pot, cover the crock part with plastic wrap and remove it and store it in the refrigerator over night.  It takes a little longer for the potatoes to get heated through to the middle (I allow about 3 hours) and will still keep for 1 1/2 hours.  I'm an Irish girl and love my spuds, and swear by this method for keeping them ready to serve for a large crowd.  This would also work well when having a mashed potato bar at a party!  This is when guests serve themselves some mashed potatoes in a stemware glass and add assorted toppings such as cheese, chives, crumbled bacon, sour cream, etc.

This next tip I've only been using a few years.  When sharing my other two tips, a listener said she put her dressing (I've learned that stuffing is what you put in the turkey and dressing is the same thing, only cooked in a casserole dish outside of the turkey!) in a crock pot.  Before gaining this knowledge, once putting together the ingredients for the stuffing/dressing, I would stuff the bird with what would fit, then put the rest in a casserole dish, cover it and set it at the back of the stove to get some of the heat from the oven.  Then I would baste this each and every time I basted the turkey and when I took the turkey out of the oven I would place this casserole dish inside to get fully heated through.  Now, I don't have to remember to put it in the oven after the turkey comes out.  I put the extra dressing in my crock pot and turn it on low when I start basting the turkey and add some of the cooking juices to this mix.  Then, when carving the turkey, I remove the stuffing and add it to this dressing to make it even more moist and delicious.  It, too is piping hot when ready to serve.

As much as I love the other two tips, this one just might be my favorite!  One of the beautiful features of a crock pot is that the food inside never dries out (if the lid is placed in position properly) because the moisture is "locked" inside.  This makes it the perfect place to heat rolls!  I keep one crock pot off to the side, out of the way in my kitchen and either place the rolls in it cool and turn it on low for 45 minutes, or preheat it on low and then put the rolls in for the last 30 minutes or so.  The rolls remain moist and are so hot they are hard to handle when transferring them to the bread basket!  I can't tell you how many times prior to using this method that I either forgot to put the rolls in the oven after the turkey came out or I forgot to take them out of the oven before sitting down at the table and once discovering they were missing found they were dry and hard (and that was with wrapping them tightly in foil!).  No more!  Again, I use a smallish bread basket, so when replenished, the rolls are nice and hot!  Enjoy!

Crock Pot Cheesy Italian Tortellini

More often than not, I use my crock pot when I won't be home to eat dinner with my family, or we're eating at different times.  When I made this meal recently, I was not going to be home.  The majority of the dish is placed in the crock pot hours before serving, the only thing my guys had to do was add the tortellini about 15 minutes before serving and then top each dish with the mozzarella cheese I had already shredded for them.  I also requested they take pictures of the last few steps for this blog.  Jimmy handled these tasks for me and did a fine job; thank you, Jimmy!

I found this recipe in one of those magazines that are sold near the checkout stand at the market many years ago.  The recipe says it yields 4 to 6 servings, but my guys ate every last drop with no leftovers and there are only 3 of them!  This time, this dish got one 7, one 8 and one 9 on the Melnarik rating scale.  The person (who shall remain nameless!) who gave the 7 said it was a little heavy on the tomato taste for him.  I didn't tell him I used a different brand of marinara sauce this time.  Perhaps that lowered his rating from the 8 it used to be.

I begin by putting the Italian sausage in a large saucepan and cook it over medium heat until browned.  As it cooks, I keep turning the mean and breaking it up with my spoon.

Once the sausage is fully cooked, I drain off any fat and place it in my pre-heated crock pot.  Hint:  Hot foods should always be placed in a pre-heated crock pot and cold foods in a cool crock pot to heat together.

To the sausage, I add the marinara sauce, fresh mushrooms, and canned tomatoes.

Those ingredients get stirred together to combine.  The crock pot gets covered and the dish is cooked on low for 7 to 8 hours.  Hint:  For most recipes, if you need to lessen the amount of time for cooking, placing your crock pot on the high heat setting will cut the cooking time in half.  For example, a dish cooked on low for 8 hours can be cooked on high for 4 hours.  In this case, by the time everything was in the crock pot, there was only 5 hours before dinner time, so I cooked it on high for 2 hours (which equalled 4 hours on low) followed by 3 hours on low, which gave me the same result as 7 hours on the low setting.

This is how it looks after the full cooking time.  

About 15 minutes before serving, the refrigerated tortellini is added.

The tortellini gets stirred into the sauce, the lid is placed back on the crock pot, and it is cooked for an additional 15 minutes.  This is the perfect amount of time to throw together a quick salad and/or garlic bread!

I find this dish is best served in a bowl, and topped with shredded mozzarella cheese .  As you can see from the picture above, my guys really like cheese!  Enjoy!

Crock Pot Cheesy Italian Tortellini

1 pound bulk Italian sausage

1 container (15 oz.) refrigerated marinara sauce

1 cup sliced fresh mushrooms

1 can (14 1/2 oz.) diced tomatoes with Italian herbs, undrained

1 package (9 oz.) refrigerated cheese tortellini

1 cup shredded mozzarella cheese 

Cook sausage in a medium saucepan or skillet over medium heat about 10 minutes, stirring occasionally, until brown; drain.  Add sausage to pre-heated 4- to 5-quart crock pot.   Add marinara sauce, mushrooms, and tomatoes; stir to combine.  Cover and cook on low heat setting 7 to 8 hours.  Stir in tortellini; cover and cook on low heat setting about 15 minutes longer or until tortellini is tender.  Top each serving with mozzarella cheese.

Crock Pot Chicken Soft Tacos

This has got to be the most simple meal I've ever put together!  I utilizes a slow cooker, so the kitchen remains cool during the hot summer days, and it's a perfect go-to meal when my guys have crazy schedules and I'm feeding everyone at different times.

I found this recipe on Pinterest, but it originated at mychocolatetherapy.blogspot.com.  I guess the author likes more than just chocolate!  This is very similar to the Slow Cooker Mexican Pulled Pork Tacos I posted recently, except that I don't even have to get an extra bowl dirty mixing the sauce.  This recipe got 8s and 9s on the Melnarik rating scale.

The first time I try a new recipe, I usually make it exactly as written, unless there is an ingredient I know my family doesn't care for (i.e. I always omit olives).  In this case, the author suggested Newman's Own brand salsa.  The jar lid indicates this is a medium salsa, but we all felt as though it could use a little more heat, so next time, I will use a different brand which will give me our desired heat level.  I used the Lawry's brand taco seasoning, as that is our favorite. 

You're not going to believe how easy this is:  In the bottom of my crock pot, I dumped the jar of salsa and the packet of taco seasoning.

Using a spoontula, I mixed those two ingredients together.  

Then I added the chicken, stirring as I added each breast to make sure they all were covered in the sauce.

After cooking them on high for 4 hours (they can also be cooked on low for 8 hours), they were completely cooked and the sauce was a bit thinner.

I removed the chicken to a cutting board, where I shredded it using two forks.

As I shredded each breast, I returned it to the crock pot.

Once I stirred the shredded chicken back into the sauce, it was ready to be built into soft tacos.

Using flour tortillas, I added some of the chicken, then topped it with shredded medium cheddar cheese, shredded lettuce and diced tomatoes.  Sour cream and guacamole can also be added, if desired.  These are tasty soft tacos that are so simple to make and there was a enough chicken left over for another evening meal, plus a couple of lunches!  Enjoy!

Crock Pot Chicken Soft Tacos

1pkg. taco seasoning mix

1 (16 oz.) jar salsa

6 boneless skinless chicken breasts (2 lbs.)

In a 4 qt. crock pot, combine taco seasoning mix and salsa.  Add chicken, turning in sauce so all pieces are coated. Cover and cook on low for 6 to 8 hours or on high for 4 to 6 hours.  Using 2 forks, shred chicken and stir into sauce.  Serve on tortillas with toppings of your choice.

Suggested toppings:

shredded cheddar cheese

shredded lettuce

diced tomatoes

guacamole

sour cream

Slow Cooker Mexican Pulled Pork Tacos

This dish has got to be the most simple and yet tasty dish I've ever made and it cooks in a slow cooker or crock pot.  It's great if my family needs to eat at different times as the meat stays warm in the crock pot until they are ready to eat.  This is one of my new favorite recipes!

I found this recipe on Pinterest, but it originated at canyoustayfordinner.com.  I've already made a point of thanking her for sharing this recipe.  Three of us ate this for dinner one night, but my oldest son wasn't home for dinner that night so took some to work the next day for lunch.  He made a point of calling me to tell me how awesome his lunch was!  Needless to say, this recipe got all 9s on the Melnarik rating scale!

You won't believe how few steps there are to make this dish.  It begins with placing a pork tenderloin in the bottom of a crock pot.

In a medium bowl, the tomato sauce gets combined with the garlic, spices and sugar.

That mixture gets poured over the pork to completely cover it.  Put the lid on and cook it either on low for 8 hours or on high for 4 hours.  Then using a fork (most recipes call for 2 forks to shred, but this was so tender that it only needed one fork to shred) shred the meat into the sauce.  The meat was so tender, I was basically stirring it with my fork to shred it and mix it into the sauce.

To serve it, I put it in small flour tortillas and topped it with shredded cheddar cheese, sour cream, lettuce and tomatoes.  This has to be one of the tastiest tacos I've ever eaten!  Enjoy!

Slow Cooker Mexican Pulled Pork Tacos

1 lb. pork tenderloin
1 15 oz can tomato sauce

1 tablespoon chili powder

1 tablespoon ground cumin

1 tablespoon brown sugar

1 teaspoon cayenne pepper

½ teaspoon salt

3 cloves garlic, minced

Place pork in the bottom of your slow cooker.  In a small bowl, stir together all remaining ingredients.  Pour evenly over pork.  Cook on low for 8 hours or on high for 4 hours.  When done, shred the pork using two forks, pulling against the grain of the meat.  Serve in warmed tortillas with shredded lettuce, chopped tomatoes, grated cheddar cheese and sour cream.  Garnish with chopped scallions.

Crock Pot Fajitas

Besides craving a particular dish, there are two good reasons I use when I choose to make dinner in a crock pot: to keep the kitchen from getting hot in the summer and when I have plans where I won't have time to put a meal together when I get home.  When my boys were younger and had sports practice after school, having dinner ready in the crock pot when we got home was the best thing ever.

I found this recipe on an ad in the newspaper for Hunt's Diced Tomatoes.  The fajitas were to be baked in the oven, but I converted the recipe to work in the crock pot one day and have never made the dish in the oven again.  The vegetables are not as crisp tender as when cooked the traditional way, but the flavor more than makes up for that.  

 The spices and oils are placed directly in the crock pot and mixed together.

Then the flank steak is cut into very thin slices.

The meat is placed in the crock pot and tossed until all of the pieces are coated with the spices.

Then the vegetables get sliced into thin strips.  To get onion strips, I cut the onion in half and then cut each half into thin strips and separate the pieces into individual pieces.

The pepper strips and onions get placed on top of the beef.

The last layer is the canned tomatoes with green chilies.  At this point, the lid could be put on top and the crock pot turned on to low for 5 hours.  Or, if the preparation is done much earlier than needed, the removable crock can be covered with plastic wrap and placed in the refrigerator until ready to cook.  When I do this, I add an extra 15 minutes to the cooking time to bring the pot up to temperature from having been in the refrigerator.  I pull the crock out of the refrigerator, take off the plastic wrap, put the lid on and turn it on and let it go.

When the dish is done and you lift the lid, you'll see that the mixture has cooked down quite a bit.  One of the keys to cooking in a crock pot is to not lift the lid until the dish is completely done (unless the recipe calls for adding an ingredient shortly before the end of cooking time) because it greatly reduces the temperature inside the crock which takes a long time to come back up to the cooking temperature.

  

Before serving, I mix the beef and vegetables together.  Cooking in a crock pot keeps everything very moist, therefore there are a lot of juices in this dish, so I use tongs to transfer the fajita meat mixture to a warmed tortilla for eating.

Sour cream and/or guacamole can be added at this point, but we like the flavor so much as is, that we never add anything to our fajitas.  Enjoy!

Crock Pot Fajitas

4 tablespoons vegetable oil

4 teaspoons chili powder

4 teaspoons ground cumin

1 teaspoon salt

2 pounds flank steak

2 cans (14.5 oz.) diced tomatoes with mild green chilies

2 small green bell peppers

2 small red bell peppers

1 large brown onion

Flour tortillas

In a 4 - 5 qt. crock pot, mix together oil and spices.  Thinly slice beef across the grain into thin strips; add to crock pot and toss until all pieces are coated in spice mixture.  Cut peppers and onions into thin strips.  Place on top of steak.  Add canned tomatoes.  Cover and cook on low for 5 hours.  Mix all ingredients in crock pot; serve in tortillas.