Cottage Cheese Chicken Enchiladas & Baked Potato Soup

I have been trying lots of new recipes lately--many of which have made it into our "Favorite" recipe list.  I would like to post two recipes that we tried out last night & tonight that we thought were really really delicious. :)

Cottage Cheese Chicken Enchiladas (in the pre-baked state)

  prep: 30 min  cook: 30 min

servings: 6

1 T vegetable oil (I used olive oil)

2 skinless, boneless chicken breasts--boiled & shredded (I just cooked them in the skillet and then shredded them)

1/2 cup chopped onion (didn't use since didn't have one)

1 (7 oz) can chopped green chile peppers

1 (1 oz) taco seasoning packet

1/2 cup sour cream

2 cups cottage cheese

1 t salt

1 pinch ground black pepper

12 (6 inch) corn tortillas

2 cups shredded Monterey Jack cheese

1 (10 oz) can red enchilada sauce (I accidentally bought the really hot version)

Directions

To Make Meat Mixture:  Heat oil in medium skillet over medium high heat.  Add chicken, onion, and green chile peppers and saute until browned, then add taco seasoning and prepare meat mixture according to package directions.

To Make Cheese Mixture:   In a medium bowl mix the sour cream and cottage cheese.  Season with salt and pepper; stir until well blended.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C).

To Assemble Enchiladas: Heat tortillas until soft.  In each tortilla place a spoonful of meat mixture, a spoonful of cheese mixture, and a little bit of shredded cheese.  Roll tortillas and place in a lightly greased 9 x 13 inch baking dish.  Top with any remaining meat, cheese mixture, enchilada, and remaining shredded cheese.  

Bake at 350 degrees F for 30 minutes or until cheese is melted and bubbly.

***The recipe is from allrecipes.com: 

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/Cottage-Cheese-Chicken-Enchiladas/Detail.aspx?src=etaf

 What we thought:  John LOVED them and I liked them a lot.  They were really delicious except for me they were a little too spicy.  John is a freak and loves anything that burns the skin off of the roof of your mouth or your tongue.  In fact, he added some hot sauce without thinking and was still able to eat them, though he admitted next time he won't use hot sauce since they were already spicy.  I think next time we make them I will drain the liquid from the green chile peppers before adding them to the chicken and I will buy a less hot version of the enchilada sauce.  Hopefully that will take away some of the mouth-scorching hotness.  I was a little skeptical at first because they were called "Cottage Cheese Chicken Enchiladas" and I was hesitant to have enchiladas that tasted like a mouthful of cottage cheese, but really it was a nice tasty touch to the dish.  In fact, I think the cottage cheese helped to bring down some of the heat.  We will definitely be making this dish again sometime soon.  It is a little bit more labor intensive than I usually like for a dinner, but it was worth it. :)

Baked Potato Soup in the Slow Cooker

5 lbs potatoes, peeled and diced into 1-2 inch chunks

1 teeny onion, diced (again, I didn't use)

4 cloves garlic (or garlic powder)

1 t seasoned salt

1/2 t black pepper

1/2 t red pepper (didn't have any, so didn't use)

2 quarts chicken broth (used organic low-sodium)

2 (8 oz) packages of cream cheese, to add at the end

crumbled bacon, cheese, or chives to garnish (we did bacon & cheese)

Directions

Use a 6 quart or larger slow cooker (very important since all the ingredients came almost to the top in our 6 quart slow cooker).  

Peel and dice the potatoes and place them in the stoneware.  

Add onion and garlic.  

Sprinkle in the seasonings and pour in the broth. 

Cover and cook on low for 8 hours, or on high for 4 (I did HIGH for 1 hour and then LOW for 6 hours).  

The potatoes should be fork tender.  

You can use a potato-masher to mash the potatoes in the slow cooker after cooking is done, or use an immersion blender.  You can also leave them chunky. (We smashed them and it made the soup smoother with little chunks and it was really good.)

After smashing the potatoes, crumble in both packages of cream cheese (I basically just pulled little chunks off and then dropped them in randomly in the slow cooker).  

Put the lid back on and cook for 30 minutes on HIGH, stirring occasionally.

Garnish with bacon, cheese, and/or chives.

You can freeze the leftovers. ( Trust me, unless you have a HUGE family, you will have A LOT of leftovers.)

***This recipe is from the Crockpot 365 blog:

http://crockpot365.blogspot.com/2009/06/crockpot-baked-potato-soup-recipe.html 

What we thought: Ever since we had a creamy potato soup for a soup & bread dinner after a Lent stations of the cross three years ago, I have been craving this soup.  And I finally found a recipe that tastes just as delicious as that soup did!!  This is a wonderfully hearty soup that makes you feel comfy, especially with the cold weather (yeah, we have snow in Denver again. blah.).  It goes great with homemade bread.  We both ate a ridiculous amount of this soup and we had crumbled some bacon for it and also topped it with a little bit of shredded cheddar cheese and it was delightful.  We have plenty of leftovers that John is already looking forward to eating.  :)  Except for the peeling and dicing of 5 lbs of potatoes (the equivalent of one of the bags of potatoes you buy at the store), it is a pretty easy process.  The hardest part is not opening up the slow cooker to eat it early while it is cooking--it smells SO good, especially after you add the cream cheese.  :)  This will most definitely be added to our slow cooker favorite recipe list (that also includes BBQ pulled pork sandwiches, salsa chicken for tacos, and beef stew).  

***

Let me know if you try either of these recipes and what you thought!  They are truly delicious and I hope you all enjoy them as much as we did. :)  Happy eating!!