White Chicken Chili

With the weather taking a bit of a turn and getting colder, I decided to make a nice hearty chili. While I made this on the stove, this could easily be put in the crock pot to cook.

Ingredients: 1 can chicken, 1 can diced green chilies, 1 can garbanzo beans, 1 can navy or white kidney beans, 1 can corn or hominy, i can sliced olives, 1 t. diced garlic, 1T oil (I use EVOO), 1 can chicken broth (or 2 cups if using homemade), 1t. cumin. If you want it spicy add 1/2-1 can of El Pato sauce (We add ours to individuals bowls after serving.)

Using a stock pot (or dutch oven) add oil, garlic, green chilies and cumin and mix together. Add in remaining ingredients. Bring to boil and simmer about 5-10 minutes. Serve with chips, cheese, salsa, tortillas, sour cream, El Pato, salsa, corn bread, etc.

If using a crock pot, cook on low 4-6 hours or high 2-3 hours.

This also makes a great food storage recipe, since all the ingredients are pantry friendly.

Spicy Lentil Soup

Since winter seems to have reemerged, here is a healthy and delicious soup to stave off the cold. I was given this recipe a couple years ago and it completely opened me up to lentils. It is from the Conscious Cuisine cookbook. Also, if you leave out the fresh vegetables, then it makes a good food storage recipe.

Ingredients:
1/4t. olive oil
1 cup chopped, peeled carrots (2 med.)
1 cup chopped celery (3 med ribs)
2 cups lentils (1 lb) washed
1 28oz can diced, peeled tomatoes in juice
1 cup chopped onion (1 lrg)
1/2t. ground cumin
1/2t. Cayenne
1t. minced garlic
8 cups vegetable stock
1t. Paprika
1 bay leaf
1t. chile powder
1t. dried basil

Directions:
Use olive oil to coat bottom of medium stock pot over med-high heat. Add onion, carrot, celery, and garlic. Cook until the onion has softened, about 2 min. Stir in the lentils, tomatoes, stock, bay leaf, cayenne, chile powder, cumin, paprika, and basil. Bring to boil, reduce heat and simmer until lentils have softened, about 20 min. Remove bay leaf before serving. Makes 12 servings.

(If you want it spicy, but not hot, then leave out the Cayenne.)

Chicken Gumbo

I was looking for something a little different for dinner and found this recipe for chicken gumbo. I substituted the summer sausage for kielbasa, since my goal wasn't to only use food storage items. My husband and I both enjoyed it. Both my girls ate it, but they complained the whole time and only finished so they could have dessert. It did make a LOT. I was able to separate two more meals into zip locks and freeze them for future dinners. I did leave out the cayenne pepper because I worried it would make it too spicy (for kids) and next time I will decrease the oregano. If you don't mind spicy and like oregano, then you could leave it. It would also be really good with shrip or prawns instead of chicken.