Salsa Black Bean Soup.

Salsa chicken & black bean soup was the second recipe picked for the winter cooking club chosen by my friend and soon to be mommy Allison. Holy guacamole this soup was delicious, like eat your weight in it delicious! You might have noticed that the recipe has the word 'chicken' in the title and that it's not in the title of the blog. That's because we were out of chicken, honestly I'm not even sure it was missed - it was pretty rockin' sans the chicken.

1) What kind of salsa did you use? Did you like it? I used Jose Madrid - Clovis Medium. I love their salsa!

2) Did you use canned or dry black beans? Canned, simply because I had them already.

3) What other changes did you make to the meal? I didn't use mushrooms, because I didn't think they fit. I also made it vegetarian, basically because we were out of chicken and I didn't want to buy any! My jar of salsa was also 12 oz instead of 16 oz. Next time I'd add two jars of salsa. When I served the soup I added: shredded sharp Cheddar cheese, dried cilantro, sour cream, chopped avocado & crushed tortilla chips.

4) After trying it once, what changes would you make next time? I think fresh cilantro added to the soup would have been really good. When I had my second bowl, I smashed up my avocado and I liked that a lot better & think smashed avocado mixed into the soup would be really good. Maybe a little lime juice.

5) Did you (and your family/DH) enjoy it? Yes, a lot! I love soup and black bean is one of my favorites!

6) Did you serve the soup with anything else? Just the additional add-ons.

7) Any other thoughts or comments you'd like to share? I'm super happy that I finally got to use my immersion blender in this soup. I've had it forever and for some reason just never used it, I think it might be my new favorite kitchen tool!


And if you have never checked out A Year of CrockPotting you need to do so, it's fantastic!

Mozzarella Parmesan Chicken.

I'm participating in another session of the online cooking group, we only had six participants this time, so it'll be a short session. The first recipe was for Mozzarella Parmesan chicken courtesy of Tricia. Despite 52 people giving it a pretty high rating of 4 out of 5 stars, this recipe just wasn't what I was expecting or something I normally make. So while this particular recipe wasn't for me, lots of people obviously like it, if you think it sounds good I encourage you to make it!

Whoever posts the weekly recipe in the cooking group, comes up with a set of questions based on the recipe. Since I'd already answered these questions, I figured I'd just re-post the questions & my answers here.

Looking at the recipe, did you think you would like this? I'll be honest, when I looked at the recipe & read the ingredients I did not think I would like it. I'm not really a fan of creamed soup meals. But I try everything, even things I don't think I'll like!

Did you and your family like this dish? It was ok - the husband liked it and I thought it was better than I anticipated.

What sides did you serve with it? I served it over penne pasta. I had planned on serving it with roasted asparagus, but wasn't feeling it today.

Will you make it again? Probably not, it just took way too long to cook and this really isn't our style of cooking.

Did you change anything? If so, what? I only used two chicken breasts & used cream of chicken soup instead of the mushroom because that's what I had. I was also lazy and did not chop garlic or onion and instead used garlic & onion powder. Oh and my total cooking time was 85 minutes for two thick chicken breasts.

Would you change anything if you made it again? If so, what? Holy salt Batman! The combination of the soups & the salty cheeses were too much & I love me some salt! I didn't see the point of separating the two soups and think you could dump it all in at once. If I ever made it again, I would completely change things around - which I guess defeats the purpose of the original recipe! I would chop up the chicken & mix with the soup, add more seasoning (basil, oregano, lemon pepper, etc.) and probably add a bag of mixed vegetables. Maybe add pasta or rice to the dish, or just serve it over that and I would like if the sauce was a little thicker.

Crock Pot Chicken Stroganoff.

I found this recipe for crock pot chicken stroganoff awhile back on Teale's Meals. I don't normally make dishes like this and was somewhat tentative to try it out, but all the reviews were favorable so I decided to give it a try. The recipe was better than I anticipated, which is always good! Even the leftovers heated up well. I served the chicken stroganoff over egg noodles, but as the recipe states pasta or rice would also be good substitutions.

I added a couple of things to the recipe, which I thought made it even better. I added sliced fresh mushrooms to the crock pot as the noodles were cooking and I also adding several different dried herbs (parsley, garlic & herb chicken seasoning, garlic powder and of course pepper). I did not cut up my chicken until the noodles were cooking, I cut the breasts into chunks and sort of let them fall apart too. The sauce had seemed really runny prior to that, but once I cut up the chicken it helped to thicken the sauce.

When I was searching for reviews for this recipe, I ran across another version which is a little different, but looks good too.

Simple and delicious.

It's been awhile since I've looked at other food blogs, so this past weekend I devoted some Internet time to seeing what others have been making in the last few weeks. I found several new recipes and ideas for future recipes, but one recipe in particular stayed with me. I love meals that not only taste delicious, but are very easy to prepare and the recipes for Mojo Crock Pot Chicken & Healthier Taco Rice from A Taste of Tina fit the bill perfectly.

Essentially I followed Tina's recipes exactly as written. I made a couple of modifications, but those were mainly for personal preferences. I omitted the onions in both dishes because I don't like them, though I did add a few shakes of dried onion to the chicken mixture. To the rice I added some frozen corn and a can of died tomatoes. I wrapped the chicken in a flour tortilla and topped it with black beans, Monterey Jack cheese and lettuce.

I had some problems with the rice, simply because for the life of me I can not make rice. During my take two with the rice, the husband even told me I shouldn't make rice anymore. Eventually, I did finish the rice and I thought it was good (the husband isn't a fan of brown rice anyway, so his opinion doesn't count). And perfecting the art of cooking rice has shot to my list of goals to complete for 2008!