Chicken Enchiladas

We've been busy over the last week cooking and freezing. So busy we had to give away some food to make more room in the freezers! I've never made Enchiladas before, but this recipie is really easy, and i think with a few tweeks it'll become a staple around here. I think this recipie made about 12 Enchiladas, and we're full after 2 each. We don't have a pan that fit all 12 Enchiladas at once in the oven, so you'll need to adjust your amounts of sauce and chicken accordingly when you're preparing the pan.

1. In a pot or deep pan saute 1 onion until tender.

2. Add 2 tablespoons garlic, 1 tsp. oregano, 1 tsp. ground cumin, 4 tblsp. chili powder, 1/4 tsp. cinnamon, 1 tblsp. cocoa, 3 tblsp. flour (I used ground quinoa), and stir for 1 minute.

3. Add 4 cups of chicken broth, bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 30minutes. Remove from heat.

4. While you're waiting for the sauce you need to prepare some chicken. We used some chicken breasts that we cooked, around 4 in total. You can use rotiseree chicken as well if it's easier, just make sure you've got a total of 3 cups worth, and shred or chop it up a bit.

5. Add 1 cup of sauce to the 3 cups of cooked chicken and mix well.

6. measure out 2 cups of shredded cheese and chop 1 bunch of green onions.

7. Divide the chicken mixture, onion and cheese among all your tortillas (8 inch tortillas work good).

8. Place some sauce in the bottom of a baking dish, just enough to cover the bottom.

9. Fill each tortilla with it's portion of cheese, onion and chicken, roll it up, and place it seam side down in the pan.

10. Spoon the remaining sauce, cheese and onions over the Enchiladas.

11. Cover with foil and bake in the oven for 20 minutes at 350F. Uncover and bake an additional 10 minutes.

Barbecue

Oh the barbecue is a wonderful thing.

French Toast

Last weekend I made up a big batch of French Toast -- add a bit of vanilla, fresh ground cinnamon, and yum! We served it with some syrup and the leftover mascarpone cheese from our Mushroom Soup recipie -- the mascarpone was to die for!

The remaining french toast I froze for later. Just separate each piece with waxed paper or saran wrap and pop the stack into a ziploc freezer bag -- but make sure you squeeze out as much air as possible. No one likes burned toast, especially freezer-burned toast!

The Best Brie

Last week we finally took the time to check out the Marin French Cheese Company in Peteluma, California. It's only 30 minutes from our place, and we are kicking
ourselves that we didn't check it out sooner!!!

They have a great selection of cheeses, and other food &
wine accompaniments -- perfect place to stop and pack a light picnic on your way to Point Reyes National Seashore!

Jonathon tried a combination of brie & heirloom tomatoes from the farmers market. The crackers we had on hand had cracked black peppercorns in them - YUM!!

Blackberry Attack

We combed the blackberry bushes down the street from our apartment and managed to pick a solid 2 pounds of berries. Not a huge amount for the die-hard berry pickers out there, but pretty good considering they're just down the street. Did I mention they're free. I made some Black&Blue Compote out of these combined with our blueberries from the market, it's cooling on the counter, give it a try, super easy and very tasty.





Black & Blue Compote

In a pot combine 3 cups of blueberries, 3 cups of blackberries and 1 cup of water, cover, bring to a boil and simmer for 5 minutes.


Uncover and add 1/4cup brown sugar, 2/3cup granulated sugar, 1/2 cup corn syrup and 1/4tsp salt, and return to a boil. While you're waiting for this to boil combine 1 tblspoon of corn starch with 2 tblspoons water and then add it to the pot.


Simmer until the mixture thickens, about 5 minutes and remove from heat. Add juice from 1 lemon.

This can be served hot or cold on yoghurt, pancakes or whatever you can think of. It makes about 5 cups of sauce. Try less sugar too, I used less than 1/2 of what the original recipie called for and this is about as sweet as I can handle.

Olive Ranch

We toured a small Olive Ranch, Terra Bella Vista Olive Oil Co., on the west side of Rohnert Park this week. If you're ever in the neighbourhood I can't recommend a visit enough! Doug and Judi are great hosts and the tour is free! It's very educational and their oil is amazing to taste!.

Here's a link for their info.

Check out this view from their property.

Good Tea

A couple of weeks ago we found the red blossom tea store in Chinatown in San Francisco. Worth checking out if you're ever there. You can buy Chamomile in bulk, which we did, and also got some of the vanilla orchid, a tasty black tea.

Saving Tomato Seeds

Marie is saving seeds from some heirloom tomatoes we bought at the farmers market!

How To Save Tomato Seeds from GardenWeb.com

Mushroom Soup

Mushroom soup for lunch. This is the best mushroom soup i've ever had, kiss bye bye to the Campbells.

1 cup dried wild mushrooms

1.5 lbs of mixed fresh mushrooms, sliced.

2 cloves garlic

1 red onion

2 tablespoons butter

2 tablespoons fresh or dried thyme

4.5 cups of stock (we used turkey, but try chicken or veg.)

2 table spoons mascarpone cheese

1 lemon

-Add hot water to the dried mushrooms and hydrate for 20min.

- In your stock pot saute the fresh mushrooms for 1min. then add the garlic, butter, onion and thyme and saute for another 2-3 min. Chop half of your soaked mushrooms and then add, along with about 1/2 cup of the soaking water. Cook for 20min.

- Add your stock, bring to a boil and simmer for 20min. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Grab your immersion blender and puree the hot soup, and mix in the mascarpone. You can add some flat leaf parsley if you've got it too.

- Serve soup into bowls and mix in a teaspoon of fresh lemon juice, top with more chopped parsley, toasted bread, a little more mascarpone.

You Make It!

We also have another blog called You Make It! since we are the DIY types. Jonathon's interested in electronics, Marie's interested in crafts, and we are both into kitchen-garden related DIY projects. You Make It! is still in it's infancy, but check back every now and then to see what's new in our DIY world....

Black Lentils

I'm posting like crazy... I'm going to come back to these and add some recipies soon. Here's the most excellent creamy black lentil recipie we had for lunch yesterday. It's relatively quick to make provided you soak the black lentils ahead of time.

Peanut Butter Cookies

I made some peanut butter cookies today. We used the Kitchen Aid grainmill attachment and ground up some whole Quinoa. First time we've used the attachment, and first time we've had the Quinoa. The recipie wasn't the greatest, but we'll definitly be doing more with the Quinoa.

Onion Soup

Marie was busy today with French Onion soup. Neither of us have ever made it before, she said she'd make it again, i'll definitly eat it again, and again, and again... Check it out.



2.5lbs onions, peeled and sliced
2 tablespoons fresh or dried thyme
6 cloves of garlic
1 bay leaf
2 tablespoons butter
6 cups stock

-Slowly fry the onions so they don't color with the thyme, garlic and bay leaf in olive oil and butter, about 15min. Then turn up the heat and cook until light golden.
-Add the stock and simmer for 20min. Add salt and pepper to taste.
-Pour your soup into bowls, slice a baguette roughly and place it on top then drizzle with oil and add some Gruyere on top. Preheat your oven and place the bowl into the oven and broil until the cheese melts and the bread gets crispy.