Homemade Flour Tortillas

I have a thing for good flour tortillas. However, back in January we started paying more attention to trans fat, and I found out that all of the flour tortillas at our grocery store had trans fat in them. (I've recently discovered that some of the uncooked flour tortillas at a few stores do NOT have trans fat - hurray!) We tried using corn tortillas for a while, and that was fine until near the end of my pregnancy. I started to have dreams about flour tortillas. Seriously.

One night, I was craving something. I narrowed it down to Sees and flour tortillas, but only mentioned chocolate to John. He was sympathetic, and offered to go to the mall to get some Sees for me. What a guy! However, I decided that even more than chocolate, I wanted to eat a flour tortilla. (Weird?) When I told John, he offered to MAKE me tortillas. I had tried several times before, but they always turned out tough. John did a quick search online, and found this recipe. Instead of going out to buy candy, he spent the rest of the evening making me tortillas. And boy were they good! Soft and so yummy. He made them for me again the night that I came home from the hospital; and a couple of nights ago he helped me make some for dinner.

They're really good plain, but we had most of them with refried beans, cheese, and taco sauce. Anyway, here's the recipe. Oh - the site it's from, Rockin Robin's Cooking Mexican Recipes, has some other recipes I'm hoping to try.

Homemade Flour Tortillas

Ingredients:
2 cups white flour
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 tsp. salt
2 tsp. vegetable oil
3/4 cup warm water

Directions:
Combine the flour, baking powder and salt in a bowl. In another bowl combine the warm water and oil. Add the water/oil mixture to the flour mixture, one tablespoon at a time and mix the dough with a fork. Once the water is mixed in, add another tablespoon of water and repeat the process until all the water is mixed into the dough. The dough will be sticky.

Lightly flour a wooden cutting board and knead the dough for about 5 minutes. If the dough is too sticky, add a little flour, but you want the dough to stay soft.

Place the dough back into the bowl and cover it with a damp towel or damp paper towel. Let the dough rest for 20 minutes.

Divide the dough into golf-ball-size balls by pinching off the dough with your thumb and fore finger. Form each ball into a nice ball shape.

Place the balls on a flat dish making sure they don't touch each other and cover with the damp cloth.

Let the dough rest again for 10 minutes.

Preheat a skillet to medium high heat.

Lightly dust a cutting board or other rolling surface with flour. Use your hands to pat a ball into a circle, then use a rolling pin to roll the dough out until it is about 1/8 thick. Add more flour if you need to as you roll the dough out.

Once you have rolled out the tortilla, place it on a preheated skillet. You don't need to add any oil or butter. Cook the tortilla for about 30 seconds. You will notice brown spots all over your tortilla. Flip it over and cook an additional 30 seconds. Don't over cook it as you want the tortilla to be nice and soft. Keep your tortillas warm by covering them in a towel on a plate or in a tortilla warmer.

Teriyaki Chicken Salad Sandwiches

We had this for dinner after the baby's blessing on Sunday. Not vegetarian, but good. :)
It's from Our Best Bites.

Teriyaki Chicken Salad Sandwiches

2 chicken breasts
Kikkoman Teriyaki Baste and Glaze
2 stalks celery, finely chopped
1 bunch green onions, chopped (the white ends only)
1/4 c. sliced almonds, toasted
1 small can of Mandarin oranges, drained
1 small can pineapple tidbits OR roughly-chopped chunks
1/3-1/2 c. mayonnaise
Salt and pepper to taste
Croissants or pitas
Lettuce leaves

Marinate chicken for at least 4 hours. Grill. While chicken is grilling, combine celery and green onions in a small mixing bowl or a plastic storage container with a lid. When chicken is done, allow to stand for about 10 minutes and then cut into bite-sized pieces. Toss with celery and onions and then add mayonnaise and mix thoroughly. Start with 1/3 c. and go from there. Add 2-3 (or more) tablespoons of Teriyaki sauce to taste.

Refrigerate for several hours.Right before serving, add oranges, pineapple, and nuts. Season with salt and pepper to taste. You may need to add more mayo and/or Teriyaki. Serve on a lettuce leaf in a croissant or a pita.

I used 8-10 split chicken breasts and that fed about 20 people. I'm guessing that the recipe as written would feed about 4 people.

Rice, Beans, and Cheese Skillet

I found this recipe a few years ago, and I've made some changes to suit our family. I like to serve this with tortilla chips. It's also good with creamy tomatillo dressing (recipe here).

Ingredients:

3 cloves garlic, minced
1 TBSP olive oil
1 can (14 1/2 oz) diced tomatoes or diced tomatoes with green chilies
(I usually use regular tomatoes because my kids and husband don't like spicy foods)
1 can (15 oz) black beans
2 cups instant brown rice, uncooked
1 1/4 cups water
1/4 cup chopped cilantro
1 cup shredded cheese (cheddar, monterrey jack, queso fresco)
tortilla chips

add ins- (when I have them)
chopped zucchini
corn

Instructions:

Heat oil in large skillet. Add garlic and cook on medium-high heat 1 minute. Add tomatoes, beans, any add-ins, and water; mix well. Bring to boil.

Stir in rice. Reduce heat to medium-low; cover. Simmer 5 minutes. Remove from heat.

Stir in cilantro; top with cheese. Let stand, covered, 5 minutes.

Serve with tortilla chips.

Minestrone Soup

I got this recipe from Ginger, and I think that Carla has one that is similar, if not the same one. I love this soup, and would make it more often if the kids were better at eating it. As it is, we have it more than they would like. :) It's great in the summer when you have fresh garden vegetables, and it's a kind of comfort food in the winter.

Minestrone Soup
1 onion, diced
1-2 cloves garlic, minced
1 carrot, sliced
1 can kidney beans, drained
1 can chopped tomatoes
1 zucchini, chopped
1 summer squash, chopped
1 potato, chopped
1 cup cooked medium pasta shells
vegetable broth
italian spices (I usually use basil and oregano)
olive oil
salt to taste (depends on the broth you use)

Saute the onion, garlic, and carrot in a little bit of olive oil until they start to get transparent.
Add the potato and the vegetable broth. Bring to boil, and simmer for about 10 minutes or until the potato starts to get tender.
Add the kidney beans, canned chopped tomatoes, zucchini, and the summer squash.
Cook for another 10 minutes or so, and add a little water if necessary.
Add the cooked shells and heat through.
Serve with parmesan cheese sprinkled on top.

Options: You could saute some celery with the onion, garlic, and carrot at the beginning. Frozen peas can be added with the beans, tomatoes, zucchini, and squash. You could also add green beans at that point. You could also substitute some other type of beans, like garbanzo beans, for the kidney beans. I like to have this soup with warm homemade bread. Ginger suggests a baguette and some kind of french cheese, like camembert.

Elephant Ears

This isn't really a dinner recipe. It's from the Joy School manual and I like to fix it for my kids' lunch every once in a while. Only I can rarely find the recipe in all of my Joy School stuff, so I'm posting it here so I'll know where to find it. :)

Elephant Ears
3 eggs
1 cup milk
1 1/2 TBSP butter (melted)
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 tsp sugar

Put eggs in a medium bowl and beat them.
Add milk and butter, then beat again.
Add flour, sugar, and salt and mix well.
Heat some oil in an electric skillet (or spray with Pam).
Pour batter in 3 or 4 inch circles.
Cook until browned and then brown the other side.
Spread with butter or applesauce.
Roll up and eat. :)

Banana Bread

2/3 cup butter, softened
2 1/2 cups flour
1 2/3 cup sugar
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 1/4 cup mashed ripe bananas
2/3 cup buttermilk
2 eggs
2/3 cup chopped walnuts (optional - we leave them out)
chocolate chips
cinnamon and sugar

Place butter in medium bowl.
Stir in flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. (It would be a good idea to stir those dry ingredients together and then add them to the butter, but I sometimes skip that step.)
Add bananas and half of the buttermilk.
Mix till moistened. Beat 2 minutes at medium speed.
Add the rest of the buttermilk and the eggs.
Beat for 2 more minutes.
Fold in nuts (if you choose to use them) and chocolate chips.
Bake in two 9 x 6 x 3 loaf pans for about 35 minutes.
Sprinkle top with cinnamon and sugar.

Cool 10 minutes and remove from pans.

Notes: If I don't have buttermilk on hand, I often use sour cream or a mixture of sour cream and milk (about a 1/3 cup of each). Or, you can put a little less than one TBSP or so of lemon juice in a measuring cup and add milk to make 2/3 cup. The texture of the bread will be thickest and richest with the sour cream; the milk alone will be the least rich.

From my Mom and Grandma

Recommended Recipes

I thought I'd list a few of the recipes that I've tried from The Pioneer Woman Cooks.
She does such a great job of writing them down (and illustrating them with photos), it would be silly for me to try to improve them. Here are the links, instead.

Delicious Creamy Mashed Potatoes -We had these with our Thanksgiving dinner. Sooo good, and just in case you have some cream cheese haters in your home, the cream cheese flavor didn't really come through. The potatoes were just GOOD.

Egg-in-a-hole - John and I sometimes have these for a snack before bed. Yum.

Farfalle with Zucchini - This is a great recipe for summer zucchini. We haven't had it for a few months, so I'm not sure whether it was a hit with the kids, or not. I'll have to update after I make it again.

Chicken Rice Soup - This was really good. A nice, creamy soup. I even added the yellow food coloring. :)

Ranch Chicken - We had this for dinner last night. I was skeptical because I'm not a big Dijon Mustard fan, but the flavor was really good. John really liked it (although he admits that not having eaten all day might have pushed this recipe from just "good" to "really good").

Crash Hot Potatoes - I know that we had these potatoes last summer. I don't think that the kids liked them, and John wasn't impressed, but I thought they were good.