Thursday, December 29, 2011

Day 4: Tex-Mex? Yes, Please.

Today's menu:
Breakfast - egg, chicken sausage and spinach casserole, banana, coffee with coconut milk
Lunch - Spinach salad with grilled chicken, hard-boiled egg and peppers, with homemade balsamic vinaigrette
Snack - apple with almond butter, cashews, black olives
Dinner - hold on to your hats...

Chicken, "Rice" and Avocado Tex-Mex bowls

This dinner was a double-whammy (in a good way) because 1) the chicken cooked in the crockpot all day. I heart crockpot recipes, and 2) I discovered that cauliflower can taste surprisingly like rice/risotto/couscous if prepared just right.

Here's the recipe:

Chicken (serves 4+)
4 chicken breasts
1 onion, chopped
1 green bell pepper, chopped
1 packet of taco seasoning (read the label to make sure all ingredients are "approved")
3/4 cup of water

Layer onions and pepper in the crockpot first, pour in the water, put the chicken on top and sprinkle 1/2 packet of taco seasoning. Cook on low for 6-8 hours. About 30 minutes before serving, remove chicken and shred, then put it back in the crockpot with the remaining seasoning. Stir it up and let it sit until ready to serve.

"Rice" (serves 4)
3 cups Cauliflower
For seasoned "tex-mex" rice, I used chili powder, cayenne, salt and fresh lime

Wash and chop cauliflower into large chunks. Use a food processor (or some websites say you can hand grate it) and chop it until it is the consistency of rice. Transfer it to a microwave-safe covered dish and microwave for a minute and a half. Season as desired.

It truly had the feel and taste of a burrito bowl from somewhere like Chipotle or Qdoba. The only topping we used was avocado, but there are lots of options. This will definitely be a repeat - next time may include homemade salsa.






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