Enchirito's

Tonight I am making Enchirito's. Your probably thinking to yourself, "what the heck is an enchirito?". Well, I'll tell you. Back when I lived in West Virginia I used to buy this box mix that was from Taco Bell that was enchirito's. It came with refried beans, taco seasoning, flour tortillas and sauce. All I had to do was add beef or chicken. Then you would assemble and bake in the oven. I loved them, and then they stopped selling them. :( very sad! So now I have made my own. I am adding a few other ingredients to make it mine.

Ingredients:

10 flour tortillas (you may use less)

1 lb ground beef

1 can refried beans

1 can red or green enchilada sauce

1 can green chili's (optional)

1 medium onion

1-2 veggie pucks(optional - recipe for veggie puck can be found here)

1 package taco seasoning

2-3 cups shredded cheese

Directions:

Preheat oven 350F.

Brown the ground beef, and onion. Then add the taco seasoning (like you were making taco's). Then add the veggie puck and green chili's. Set mixture aside.

On the flour tortillas spread 1-2 tbsp refried beans on the tortilla (enough to cover surface).

Then add 2-3 spoons of beef mixture. (enough to fill the middle of the tortilla,

then add a couple sprinkles of cheese.

Roll and set in a 13X9 pan. Repeat until full, may take 8-10 tortilla's depending on how full you make the tortillas.

Next, pour enchilada sauce on top. Sprinkle with cheese.

Bake 350F oven for 25-30 minutes. Till bubbly and cheese has melted.

Serve Warm. with sour cream and other toppings such as lettuce, tomato, onion, olives, even guacamole. This is a yummy dish. Adding the veggie puck adds a nice added veggie and vitamin punch to the dish, they won't be able to tell.

I was able to make enough for two families=2 pans. I could have put them all in one pan, but realized I would have way too many leftovers. So I'm going to share the love. Give one pan away.

Half Veggie, Half Meat - Meatballs

I have been trying to think of a way to infuse my kids food with more veggies then they normally eat every day. Since it's pulling teeth to get some of them to eat 2TBSP of green beans. I know ridiculous. So since last night I had to pull teeth to get the green beans eaten. Today I thought i'd hide the veggies. Of course, they eat spaghetti sauce, but not usually the diced tomatoes. So here is what I did. Also, I tried a meat ball before I put it in the spaghetti sauce and it was fabulous!

Ingredients:

2 veggie pucks (see recipe for veggie pucks)

1 onion minced

1 bell pepper minced

1/2 cup potato flakes

1/2 cup italian bread crumbs

1 lb ground beef

1 lb ground sausage - bulk

3 eggs

3 TBSP ketchup

1 pkg italian dressing dry mix

1 pkg au ju dry mix

2 Tbsp salt

1 Tbsp fresh ground pepper

Preheat oven to 400F. In a large mixing bowl, add all ingredients. blend well using hands, until all ingredients are incorporated. Spray a jelly roll pan with PAM. Then, using a scoop, take a scoop full of the mixture and place it on a jelly roll pan. Repeat until all the mixture are in balls on the jelly roll pan in a single layer. This made 47 meatballs for me. They can be touching that's fine. They shrink slightly as they cook. Place jelly roll pan with the meatballs in the 400F oven for 45 minutes. Then cool and remove. Add to spaghetti sauce and eat with pasta or on a hoagie roll.

These are so delicious and good for you, full of vitamins and veggies. It's a great way to get the veggies into those picky eaters, whether they be your husband or your kids or both.

I also, added to my 2 cans HUNTS traditional spaghetti sauce 2 veggie pucks, and two cans of diced tomatoes. To give further veggie factor. This is so yummy! Enjoy! The sauce and meatballs are simmering in the crock pot for a nice easy dinner tonight. The meatballs can be made a head of time cooled and placed in a ziploc freezer bag and used at a later time. They freeze well too!

Veggie Pucks

Ok, I had a friend on Facebook ask me what veggie pucks were. Since, I was making another batch of chicken stock and boiled chicken I thought I'd share with you how to make veggie pucks and not waste valuable nutrients and veggies. :) I like to get my money's worth when I'm making chicken stock and boiled chicken. I don't throw anything but the bones away. I put to use my hand blender and make these wonderful veggie pucks. How I got the name was looking at them after they were frozen. I was trying to figure out what to call them. They look a little bit like a hockey puck and are veggies. So I decided to call then veggie pucks.

With a lot of parents trying to figure out how to get their kids to eat more veggies and I'm struggling with the same thing, I figured that this would be a good way for me to "Hide" the veggies into things that you wouldn't normally add them to, so they can get the nourishment from them. I have added the veggie pucks to two different recipes so far, and I've got lots more in mind. So keep checking back on how to incorporate more veggies into your kids meals. :)

Directions:

Follow directions for making chicken stock. After you separate out the broth, chicken and veggies here is what you do.

Since when I pull the chicken out I seem to always pull some of the veggies out too. I remove

chicken from the bone, set the onion peels, bay leaf and bones in my trash pile.

Chicken pulled off of the bone.

Chicken broth

Chicken bones, onion peels, bay leafs

Veggies and spices left.

I add the leftover veggies back into my veggie bowl. After my chicken broth has been strained, the added spices and veggie debris left in my cheese cloth I add back to my veggie bowl.

blending the veggies and spices

Once I have all of the veggies and leftover spices, I use my hand blender to blend them all down. It turns into an orange mixture that resembles canned pumpkin.

a fully blended veggie mix

After it's well blended, I pull out two muffin pans (12 total muffin cups). I take my 1/3 measuring cup and place 1/3 cup into each muffin cup. Once the entire mixture is in the muffin cups, I place the muffin tins into the freezer to freeze the veggie mix.

adding by 1/3 measuring cup to my muffin tins

a perfect fit into my muffin tins.

Once they are frozen (usually 2-4 hours)

I remove from the muffin tin

and place in a freezer ziploc bag.

The veggie pucks are now finally ready for use in any dish you desire. These would be good to use when your making homemade chicken fingers as part of the dredge, or added to pretty much anything. Enjoy!

They are not the most beautiful thing to see, but full of wonderful nutrients for a healthier diet :)