Chicken Flautas

When I was growing up, my grandmother really took most of the day to cook a simple recipe (or at least she would say that it was). I would remember when we would be making fresh ground corn tortillas it was such a pain, but in the end it still tasted great!

On the flip side, it does take plenty of steps to make some of the various recipes that I have presented here on this blog. Chicken flautas is one of those recipes that can be rather time consuming (assuming that you want to do it from scratch). As most know me, I tend to want to do everything from scratch (at least most of the time). Hope you enjoy this recipe as this is something my grandmother and mom taught me a long time ago.

Ingredients:

1 whole chicken (7 - 12 lb)
2 onion, diced
3 tbsp garlic powder
4 tbsp chili powder
2 tbsp cumin
2 tbsp tomato bouillon
Salt and pepper to taste
Corn tortillas 
1 cup vegetable oil
3 tsp chili powder (for the chili oil)


First, start with obtaining a large pot. Fill this halfway with water. Add half of a onion. Make sure you rinse the chicken. This just helps clean out any preservatives that the chicken may have had. Start to bring to a boil.

 

After you have added the chicken and onion, add the spices (1 tsp garlic, 1 tsp cumin, 1 tsp ancho chile pepper) to your boiling pot. Add a liberal amount of pepper and salt.

 

Continue to bring to a boil. Once it has been done, and then take out of the chicken stock. Allow for it to cool. After it has been cooled sufficiently, take the meat off of the bone placing it in a separate bowl.

 

After you have taken the meat off of the chicken bone, skim the fat off of the chicken broth.

 

So now you are ready to season and recook the chicken meat. Start with placing a teaspoon of olive oil. Place the chicken into the pan. Get the diced onion into the cooking chicken. Continue to cook until onion is somewhat translucent.

 

While the chicken is continuing to cook, add a cup of the chicken broth. Allow to cook for about 5 minutes. Add the spices (1 tsp cumin, 2 tbsp chili powder, 2 tbsp garlic powder, 2 tbsp tomato bouillon) to the chicken.

 

  

Allow it to cook until the chicken is well covered with the spices. While that is continuing to cook, start to heat the corn tortillas. Flip and heat enough so you are ready to make your flautas. Take the chicken mixture off of the heat and allow to cook.

Start to heat the vegetable oil. Prep the bowl by having the papertowels ready in order to drain the flautas of oil. Stuff each tortilla with the chicken mixture. Season the oil with the last of the chili powder.

 
Once the oil and chili powder have mixed well together. Start to fry the chicken flautas flap side down. Allow to cook until golden brown. Flip the flautas and cook on the other side. Take out of the oil and place into the bowl allowing the oil to drain off each flauta. Notice that I used toothpicks in order seal the flautas.

 

 

Have this with some mexican style beans and rice. Sometimes I may not seal the flautas all the way in order to allow them to open easily to add salsa, lettuce, tomato, cheese and avocado.

Baked Squash and Penne

I do so love Italian Cuisine. If I could, I would have Italian all the time. The only problem is that if I eat too much of it, I would be back to being a rather big boy and I don't necessarily want that to happen. The only consolation is that I can have it in moderation. Again, like most things, I might make a big batch of something, but I will freeze it and enjoy it with a nice side salad.

Well for this go around, I wanted to make something fresh that would be rather good for you. We have a community garden out in the back of our place. We have okra and plenty of squash. Needless to say, we ended up having a bumper crop of both.

Ingredients:

4 cups Spaghetti Sauce
2 tbsp basil
2 tbsp thyme
1 lb ground turkey
1 tbsp olive oil
salt and pepper to taste
4 - 5 cups squash (zuchinni, yellow or other types)
1 medium onion
2 tbsp butter
1 16 oz bag penne pasta
2 cups italian cheese (mozzerella, parm and asiago)

Start by working with the 4 cups of Spaghetti Sauce. Now I had my own sauce that I had made. Either if you use Not Really Scratch made (Store bought) sauce or your own, you might need to add additional fresh basil and thyme to the sauce. This will add some extra is great. If need be add more salt and pepper to taste.

 

 
While the sauce is continuing to cook, start to cook the ground turkey. Cook the meat until its browned. After it has browned, place it into the spaghetti sauce. I like to add more white wine. Nothing like having a glass of wine while cooking!

 

Boil the water making sure that it is well salted. Once the pot is boiling, add the pasta. Make sure the pasta is cooked until tender. Drain the pasta making sure it is free of water. Place the pasta into the pasta dish.

 

 

Chop up the squash and half the onion. We have zuchinni, yellow and white acorn squash. In a pan with the pats of butter, lightly saute all of the squash and onion. Once it is well cooked, take off the eat and place off to the side.

Now add the squash to the cooked pasta. Lightly mix trying to avoid bruising the squash.

 

 

Now that you have the squash mixed with the penne pasta, you can start to add the spaghetti sauce to the pasta. Be sure to cover the sauce well over the penne.

 

Preheat the oven to 350. Cover the pasta dish with foil and place into the oven and allow to bake covered for about 30 minutes. After the 30 minutes are over, uncover the pasta dish and sprinkle the cheese over the pasta. Allow it to continue to cook until the cheese has melted.

 

I love this dish as it's rather light. We enjoy it with a nice side salad and some garlic bread. Of course like most things, I used food savers so I can enjoy it later on during the week.