Cheese Potato Soup recipe and Nacho Mama's Nachos

So, Monday night was the BCS National Championship game, or the Superbowl of College Football, basically. I used to not care about that stuff, seriously, I went to High School football games to hang out with the band. Later I saw a college game and amused my section greatly by screaming out, "THAT'S NOT NICE!!" at two scholar-athletes who had tackled a third in a particularly ungentlemanly fashion. However I did enter into a mixed marriage, since I am Roman Catholic and my husband is a Football Fan, so I learned at least the fundamentals of the game and picked a team to root for and now I watch college ball, SEC in particular and the very rare pro-game. I'm not into fantasy football nor do I even particularly think about football when it isn't in season; sort of like strawberries. Anyhow since "my team" wasn't in the game last night, I basically still didn't care, but it was a big SEC rivalry game so I thought up a menu that was game-worthy.

Nacho Mama's Nachos -- I had two open bags of semi stale chips. These make a terrific bottom layer for nachos since they sort of re-crisp in the oven, but never get shatteringly crispy which can make nachos hard to eat. Cover a 9 x 13 cookie sheet (baking sheet) with the chips. Add a protein to the top, seasoned beans, refried beans, cooked shredded chicken, seasoned ground beef or turkey or TVP. Cover all with cheese and bake at 350, till cheese is melted and chips starting to brown.

Now let your imagination run wild, as we top it with shredded lettuce, homemade guacamole, salsa, and our old stand-by plain yogurt (in place of sour cream). My husband requested (and received) a small bowl of that velveeta and chili dip to off-set all of the wholesomeness. Your favorite toppings might include anything from salsa verde to chipotle BBQ sauce to ranch dressing here.

Tonight's dinner was actually meatless in lieu of having a meatless Monday.

Cheese Potato Soup

Saute in a stock pot with butter and olive oil (olive oil only for vegans) some onion and celery, let it sweat and hit it with a heavy pinch of kosher salt. To this add a quart of your favorite veggie broth and let that all simmer together. Meanwhile, skin and chop about 4cups of potatoes. Add those potatoes to the broth, bring up the heat and let them boil/simmer (your choice) until they are cooked. Take the pot off the heat and finely grate some cheese of your choice into the pot (I used some colby jack because I had it on hand), 1/4 cup at a time, hit it with an immersion blender after each addition of cheese and blend until smooth. Mix about 1 cup of milk with 2 teaspoons to 1 TB of cornstarch, add in several spoonfuls of the soup to the mixture before adding it to the pot. This dissolves and activates the corn starch as a thickener and binder as well as tempers the milk, mix in well with the immersion blender. Taste and adjust seasonings (salt and pepper) and then serve with or without soy bacon bits, salad and bread.

New format!

I am only going to do in-depth posts on Monday, Wednesday and Friday. I will have much shorter posts on Tuesday, Thursday, Saturday and Sunday.

Okay here is my menu for the week:

Meatless Monday: Black Bean nachos, made with refried black beans, shredded cheese, shredded romaine lettuce, and mild salsa fresco.

Tuesday: French farmhouse style baked chicken breasts, sauteed green beans, brown rice, glazed carrot coins.

Wild, weird or wacky Wednesday: Individual meatloaf "cupcakes", steamed broccoli and cauliflower, macaroni and cheese.

Thursday: chicken and sausage couscous with vegetables

Fish Friday: Probably yellow tail snapper (gotta call my fish guy), steamed snow pea pods and Asian peanut-sauce broccoli slaw.

Saturday: Homemade Pizza and salad

Sunday: Roast beast with potatoes, onions and carrots

Tonight's dinner was GREAT. I made some black beans a few weeks ago and had extra, so I froze them. Today I popped them out of the plastic container and reheated/defrosted them in a pan on the stove-top with a little olive oil. When I cook my beans they are very lightly seasoned so I can use them in a variety of dishes or ways. To these beans I added some cumin and adobo seasoning and when they were nice and bubbly I mashed them with a potato masher; making essentially refried black beans. I put some corn chips on a cookie sheet and spread the black beans over the top and then added a couple generous handfuls of grated cheese. I baked them in the oven at 425 degrees for maybe 5 minutes (long enough for the cheese to melt and everything else to crisp. I cut the nachos into small wedges with a large kitchen knife and put them on plates. I topped each serving with some lettuce, some defrosted corn kernels and some salsa fresca. A good serving of vegetables, lots of nice lean protein, and some whole grain chips made this a tasty and pretty nutritionally sound meal. If your family likes you could also add some cubed avocado or guacamole to the proceedings and get a pretty nice essential fatty acid serving as well.

Mondays are still a hard night for us because of our older daughter's dance class, so this would be a great quick meal for any busy evening. You can even "re-fry" canned black beans. Simply get some sort of fat sizzling in a pan, add your beans and a little of the water they came in, stir, season and mash. These are much better for you than canned refried beans which are very high in fat and sodium and they go together almost as quickly.