Taco Cups

It's almost game time!! Are you still looking for something to take to a Super Bowl party this weekend? This recipe is great because you can assemble them the day before and bake them up onsite. We had this for a fast mid-week meal paired with a salad and some Spanish rice. 


Taco Cups
Recipe adapted from Plain Chicken 


Ingredients:
1 lb lean ground beef 
1 packet taco seasoning
2/3 cup water
1 can black beans, drained
1 small can of corn, drained
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese
48 wonton wrappers

Optional Toppings: sour cream, taco sauce or salsa.

DIRECTIONS:  Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Brown the ground beef in a large skillet over medium-high heat. Drain grease. Stir in taco seasoning, water, black beans and corn. Bring mixture to a boil, and then reduce heat to low. Let simmer for 10 minutes or until water is absorbed.

Spray 24 regular muffin cups with cooking spray. Place one wonton wrapper in each muffin cup. Divide half of the meat mixture between muffin cups, about a tablespoon in each cup. Sprinkle half of the cheese over the meat. Repeat layers with another wonton wrapper, taco meat and cheese. 

Bake at 375 for 15-18 minutes or until cheese is bubbly and wrappers are golden brown. Serve with your favorite taco toppings.

Enjoy!

Ranch Chicken Packet

Oh, how I love Pinterest!! I don't have to dig through magazines and cookbooks to find recipes anymore. I love that I can sort recipes into a folder for quick reference. To say that Pinterest has changed my life would be stretching it, but it really has made meal planning a lot more fun!!


I pinned this recipe from Big Oven on Pinterest. Everyone loved it and it has been added to the meal rotation!


Ingredients:

• 1 package Stove Top stuffing; chicken flavor
• 1 1/4 cup Water
• 4 Boneless skinless chicken breast
• 4 cups Fresh broccoli florets
• 1 cup Shredded cheddar cheese
• 4 slices Bacon; cooked & crumbled (optional)
• 4 Tbls Ranch dressing

Directions

• Preheat oven to 400 degrees
• Spray 4 large sheets of heavy-duty foil with oil. Combine stuffing mix and water. 
• Spoon 1/4 of the stuffing mixture onto the center of each foil sheet. Top stuffing with a 6oz. chicken breast half. Top chicken with 1 c. broccoli. Sprinkle with 1/4 of the cheese and 1 slice of bacon, crumbled. I love bacon but you really don't have to have it in this recipe. If you are short on time, I would just skip this step. Drizzle with 1 T. ranch dressing
• Fold foil into a packet leaving room for heat to circulate inside. Place packets on a cookie sheet and bake 35-45 mins depending on the size of the chicken breast. Remove packets and let stand 5 mins.

Enjoy!

This is how my packet looked. The original recipe called for 6 oz chicken breasts to bake for 35 mins, I had Costco chicken breasts and it took about 45 mins. So, use your best judgement on the cook time. Chicken breasts are done when the internal temp is 165 degrees.





This is how the chicken looked after it was dished out. Pretty darn tasty!! The chicken stayed really moist, the broccoli was tender but not over done and the stuffing was gooey. 

DIY Fabric Flower Clips

I love being crafty!! So, when I was planning my wedding a couple years ago, I added lots of personal hand-made touches. My favorite wedding craft project was making flower clips for my hair and shoes. Since then, I have made a few of these flowers for some of my friends’ weddings. These steps are a loose guideline so play around with your fabric and see what works best for you. 

Tools Needed:

Needle & thread

Silk Flower taken apart

A good pair of scissors

Straight pens

¼ yard of silk or chiffon

½ yard of tulle

Beads, pearls and rhinestone embellishments

Step 1

Fold a square piece fabric in half a couple times until you have four layers. Use one of the petals from a silk flower as a guide and pin it to the fabric in two or three places. Cut the fabric around the guide. Repeat 3-4 times with the fabric and with the tulle. 

Step 2

Stack fabric and tulle petals on top of each other randomly alternating the type of fabric and direction. 

Step 3
Sew a couple stitches through the center of the flower to keep it together. Then randomly pinch sections of the petals and stitch to secure. This step with add volume to the flower. 

Step 4

Use a hot glue gun to secure embellishments to the center of the flower.

Step 5
Attach each flower to a barrette, hair clip, safety pin or headband. The flowers in these photo were to embellish to flip flops so I used a barrette that would be large enough to clip around the straps of the shoes. 

Enjoy!