Just How Were Those Chalupas

Monday evening my beans were as hard as if they'd only been soaked. There were no acids in the mix so I couldn't understand why they hadn't softened. I wound up removing all the beans and running them through the food processor as I wanted them to be more of a paste than a whole bean. Hours later and even this didn't help. I ended up serving a Knorr frozen dinner and some leftovers for dinner. I decided to leave the chalupa mixture cook all night in hopes of saving five quarts of food from the compost bin!

Cooking all night did the trick. I did add more spices Tuesday morning as the aroma was spicy, but the flavour was not. My husband and daughter really enjoyed the chalupas. They were served on tortillas with some shredded cheese, lettuce, salsa and sour cream. They were messy, too! While I liked this recipe, I do believe I'll use chicken to make it in the future. The pork was just too fatty. Tuesday morning I scooped most of the broth and about 1/4 of the mixture into a big bowl which I placed on an icepack in the fridge so that I could easily skim the fat from the top. It didn't seem to be that much, but as I continue to eat more fresh fruits and vegetables, my mouth's fat tolerance decreases.

Using just the chalupa mixture and a bit of cheese in each wrap, I froze 30 wraps for future use -- half of them the 12" size. They'll be good for lunches or a quick heat and eat meal when I don't feel like cooking (or have a dinner catastrophe like hard beans!) This is quite hardy and filling, too!

I recommend this recipe especially if you'll have a large gathering of folks who like the spicy stuff! It makes quite a lot, so if you had 15 people to feed you could easily do it with this recipe.

Thank goodness it's chicken breasts tonight! After the heavy denseness of last night's meal I'm looking forward to something light and unfatty!

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Crock Pot Chalupas

Ah! Yet another crock pot meal! I happen to have a wealth of dry pinto beans in my pantry and found this recipe while looking for ways to use them that might please the whole family. Pork roasts went on sale this week so Chalupas it is! We did, however, have to spend nearly an hour removing the giant slab of fat from our roast. Yuck! Next time, we'll have the in-store butcher do it.

For crockpot chalupas, you'll need:

3lb pork roast
1lb dry pinto beans
2 garlic cloves, minced
1 T ground cumin
1 T dried oregano
2T chili powder
1 T salt (we added a teaspoon)
4oz can chopped green chilies (I used red)
water

Last night I ran my pinto beans through my food processor as I would prefer the beans be more like refried than solid beans. After grinding them, I soaked them in water just to cover them, adding a teaspoon of baking soda to help soften these old beans of mine. I rinsed the beans this morning and added water to cover them again.

Into the crock pot went the roast and all the other ingredients. I did chop the chilies in the food processor as well to better disperse them through the mixture. Once everything was in, I added the beans and their water. I moved the roast a bit to make sure some of the liquid got underneath it.

This will cook on high for one hour then low for six. After six hours, I'll remove the roast, shred it with a fork and return the meat to the mixture. Then it will cook one more hour on high.

I will serve this in tortillas with lettuce, green onion, salsa and light sour cream (plain yogurt for me.) This is a very large recipe and we'll have two meals from it this week. Tomorrow, I will take what is left of the mixture and make wraps that I'll freeze. My husband and daughter will be able to pull one out of the freezer and reheat or add to their lunchboxes. I'll let you know how many I end up freezing!

I know that my youngest two cannot eat the spicy foods, so I have a bean salad for my two year old (who adores beans) and leftover pork chop, apples and sweet potatoes for my seven year old.

One day all the planets and stars will align just so and I'll find myself preparing one thing for everybody! A girl can dream, can't she?

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