Chicken Mushroom Enchiladas with Cheese sauce

 

Last night for dinner I made enchiladas. I usually make a 9x13 pan and then have leftover filling. Last night however, I decided to make a 9x9 pan as well. 

 

Enchiladas:

Filling:

1 package of boneless skinless chicken breast, about 2 pounds. 

1/2 large onion, chunked

2 tsp cumin

salt and pepper

2 cloves garlic, diced finely

about 4 c. water

Put the above in a crockpot on high heat for about 6 hours, or until the chicken falls apart. You can do this on the stovetop, but it heats up the house more. I had errands to run, so I opted for the crockpot.

1 onion, diced

2 cloves garlic, diced finely

8 oz mushrooms, sliced

pulled chicken

salt and pepper

cumin

red pepper seed

Herdez Salsa Verde

Saute the onion and garlic in olive oil until tender and starting to golden. Add the mushrooms and chicken and cook until most of the water evaporates. Add the seasonings to taste. Add about half a jar of salsa verde.

In the meantime, start working on the cheese sauce:

1/3 c butter

1/3 c flour

3 c milk

2 c cheese (I used a 10 oz round of queso quesadilla, but the recipe I found called for 2 cups cheddar cheese)

salt and pepper to taste

Melt the butter in a large sauce pan. Stir in the flour. Stir in the milk and cheese and cook on low until the cheese is melted. Stir regularly to keep the bottom from sticking and burning. This cheese sauce recipe made more than enough for both pans of enchiladas I made.

When the filling and the cheese sauce are ready, it's time to assemble the enchiladas. You will need:

a package of corn tortillas

1/2 jar of salsa verde

cheese sauce

chicken/mushroom filling

Spray a 9x13 pan with nonstick spray, and heat the oven to 350.

If you heat up the tortillas prior to putting filling in them, they are less brittle.  We have a gas stove, so I turn a burner on very low heat and put a tortilla on it, flipping a couple times until it is warmed up. 

Put a couple tablespoons of filling in the middle of a tortilla, fold over the tortilla, and put the fold side down in the pan. When all the enchiladas are in the pan, cover with cheese sauce and drizzle some salsa verde on top for color. 

Bake until the cheese and exposed tortillas start to brown, probably about 15-20 minutes.

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Native Plant Sale

Yesterday, I went to the Native Plant Sale at the Springfield Nature Center. I first heard about this sale when I was in college, working on the LEED Platinum Habitat for Humanity House that was my senior project. We incorporated native plants into the landscaping and this sale was a great resource for us.
There were two vendors yesterday, Pan's Gardens and Missouri Wildflower Nursery. I purchased all my plants from Missouri Wildflower Nursery because they had small plants available for $2.50, or large plants for $4.75 so I could get more plants for the same amount of money. Pan's only had large plants.
The plants I bought are for the north side of the greenhouse, which is shady and will get runoff from the north portion of the greenhouse roof, so it will be fairly moist too. I bought:
Jacob's Ladder x 1
Lobelia x 1
Cardinal flower x 3
Downy Skull Cap x 1
Columbine x 1

I also have Leatherwood Ferns x 3 that I purchased at Lowe's a couple weeks ago. They were in sealed plastic baggies, similar to how Lowe's sells asparagus crowns and flower bulbs. I made sure to buy only ones that had green showing.

Also a short garden report.... I pulled up all the cover crop of winter wheat on Friday evening. The kohlrabi and golden beets have sprouted but nothing else in the root veggie bed. We got a pretty hard rain last week and I some of the pea seeds surfaced and were 3 feet from where I planted them... I harvested 3 spears of asparagus last week, rinsed and froze it. There are a few more spears peeking through the dirt but the weather can't decide if it wants to be hot or cold (example: earlier this week it was 30 degrees, high today near 80.) so I think the asparagus is stunted. The greek oregano, flat parsley, curley parsley and golden oregano have come back from last year.

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Seedling update

The tomatoes are looking good! Some of the delinquent peppers and eggplant are starting to sprout (finally).







I planted endive and cilantro last week. I think all of the endive sprouted, and several of the cilantro have started, but I'm keeping the plastic on the cilantro until there are more sprouts.

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Music Monday: Rodney Atkins - "0Farmer's Daughter"

... I'm the farmer's daughter!

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Music Monday - "This Too Shall Pass" by OK Go

Ok, sorry I forgot to post a video this Monday. This is hilarious...maybe more-so because I was in marching band...

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Garden Report 03.24.2011

Tonight I planted some more things under the grow lights: cilantro, endive, red had mexican wildflower, yellow coneflower.
The wildflowers are going behind the greenhouse. I also bought three fern roots when I bought the greenhouse accessories the other night. The ferns are supposed to do well in shade, and since the backside of the greenhouse faces north...

Also replanted banana and poblano pepper seeds, and thai long purple and rosa bianca eggplant. Only have one rosa bianca seedling and it is growing slow as molasses. Only have one banana pepper and two poblanos. 

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Greenhouse work

Yesterday I installed the brackets for my shelves on the south wall of the greenhouse, as well as some organizational items. The shelves will be white painted 1x12.
For the long handled tools, I installed a 17" spring bar with clips , for short handled tools I installed a bar with hooks.

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