The BEST Chicken Tacos recipe EVER!!!!

    This is the chicken tacos recipe that I stole...I mean... "borrowed" from my mom. It's by far the best recipe I've ever tasted when it comes to tacos. Don't believe me? Try it yourself! It's kinda a lot of work but its worth it. The shredded chicken turns out super full of flavor and really moist. This is also a great way to use leftover cooked chicken, just skip the boiling and shredding part. This recipe makes enough for about 18 tacos with leftovers the next day. I use the leftovers for nachos. Yum :)


You'll need:
1 whole chicken
1 green bell pepper
2 stalks of celery (without leaves)
1 T. extra-virgin olive oil
4 or 5 T. taco seasoning
Toppings of your choice (lettuce, tomatoes, cheese, 
sour cream, etc...)


   First, take the insides out of the chicken and dispose of them. Yuck :P Okay. Now put the chicken in a big soup pot and fill it with water about 2 inches up the side of the pot. Once it comes to a boil, cover with a lid. Now comes the really tedious part. Boil the chicken for (I know) an hour. Once it's done cooking, carefully take it out of the pot and put it on a plate, reserving the broth from the bottom of the pot (don't worry if there's fat floating around...it gets strained out later). 

  While the chicken cools, chop the celery and bell pepper.

Then heat the olive oil in a saucier or a large skillet, and add the veggies. Saute until soft, about 7 minutes. Then add 1 tablespoon of the taco seasoning to the veggies and stir. 

 

If the chicken is cool enough to handle, start shredding the meat with your fingers and tossing it in.

     While on medium heat, pour a quarter of the broth from the pot through a mesh strainer into the pan with the chicken and vegetables. While you continue to add chicken, alternate taco seasoning and broth, pausing in between to let the liquid evaporate, until you have used all of both .

   The meat is done! Now all you have to do is put the taco shells in the oven on 350 degrees for 7 minutes, and prepare the toppings for your super-yummy tacos :) There'e nothing wrong with having too much cheese...

 The last step is assembling the tacos. Just stuff it in and you're done! That wasn't so hard, was it? Enjoy!

Dark Chocolate Cupcakes with Dulce de Leche Buttercream Frosting

Okay. I'll admit it. I'm obsessed with cupcakes.

I love the smell of them baking in the oven. They're the perfect combination of cake, frosting and cuteness.

I probably make some kind of cupcakes almost every weekend. And this is, in my opinion, one of the BEST cupcake recipes out there. Cupcake Recipe courtesy of BrownEyedBaker (my absolute favorite blog ever).

Dark Chocolate Cupcakes

Yield: 12 cupcakes

Prep Time: 20 minutes | Bake Time: 18-20 minutes | Cooling Time: 45 minutes

8 tablespoons (1 stick) unsalted butter, cut into 4 pieces
2 ounces bittersweet chocolate, chopped
½ cup (1.5 ounces) Dutch-processed cocoa powder
¾ cup (3.75 ounces) all-purpose flour
½ teaspoon baking soda
¾ teaspoon baking powder
2 eggs
¾ cup (5.25 ounces) granulated sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon table salt
½ cup (4 ounces) sour cream

1. Adjust oven rack to lower-middle position and preheat to 350 degrees F. (If you are using a non-stick muffin pan, heat the oven to 325 degrees F.) Line standard-size muffin pan with baking cup liners.

2. Combine butter, chocolate, and cocoa in medium heatproof bowl. Set bowl over saucepan containing barely simmering water; heat mixture until butter and chocolate are melted and whisk until smooth and combined. (Alternately, you can microwave the mixture at 50% power, stirring every 30 seconds until completely melted.) Set aside to cool until just warm to the touch.

3. Whisk flour, baking soda, and baking powder in small bowl to combine.

4. Whisk eggs in second medium bowl to combine; add sugar, vanilla, and salt until fully incorporated. Add cooled chocolate mixture and whisk until combined. Sift about one-third of flour mixture over chocolate mixture and whisk until combined; whisk in sour cream until combined, then sift remaining flour mixture over and whisk until batter is homogeneous and thick.

5. Divide the batter evenly among muffin pan cups. Bake until skewer inserted into center of cupcakes comes out clean, 18 to 20 minutes.

6. Cool cupcakes in muffin pan on wire rack until cool enough to handle, about 15 minutes. Carefully lift each cupcake from muffin pan and set on wire rack. Cool to room temperature before icing, about 30 minutes.

(Recipe adapted from Cook’s Illustrated)

Now that we have the cupcakes out of the oven, you can start the frosting while they cool. This is my favorite part. If you don't have Dulce de Leche on hand, you could use any caramel, but if you ask me, it's worth taking a trip to the store. Frosting Recipe courtesy of joy the baker (another really great blog)

For the Frosting:

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened

8 ounces cream cheese, softened

3/4 cup dulce de leche, plus more for drizzling

1/4 teaspoon salt

2 to 3 cups powdered sugar

Place cream cheese in the bowl of an electric stand mixer. Beat on medium speed for about 30 seconds, until very soft and pliable. Stop the mixer, scrape down the sides of the bowl and add the butter and dulce de leche. Beat on medium speed until well incorporated. Stop the mixer and add the salt and powdered sugar. Beat on medium speed for about 3 minutes, until fluffy and lighter in color. Generously spoon frosting on top of cupcakes, or use a large frosting tip to pipe on frosting.

   I garnished the finished cupcakes with shaved dark chocolate. To shave the chocolate, just get a dark chocolate bar and use a vegetable peeler to shave off little curls. If the chocolate is too cold, the curls will come off crumbled and if this is the case, just pop the chocolate bar in the microwave for 15-20 second and try again. It just takes a bit to get used to it. And now you're done!

That wasn't so hard, was it?

Doctor Who Mints: Fondant Gone Geeky

   Did I mention how obsessed I am with Doctor Who? Extremely obsessed. If you're not familiar with Doctor Who, it's a British sci-fi series about a time traveler called the Doctor. It's my favorite show. Anyway, I'm also pretty into making stuff out of fondant. Fondant is basically like edible play dough that can be flavored, colored, molded and painted. This time I decided to do Doctor Who themed mints, but with this recipe you could use the fondant to make any shape you want. You could also experiment with adding different flavors in place of the mint extract. (recipe adapted from The Secret Life of Food)

Ingredients:
1 1/2 T. Softened Butter
1 1/2 T. Light Corn Syrup
1/4 t. Salt
3/4 t. Mint Extract
2 c. Powdered Sugar

   First, in a medium bowl, mix the butter, mint extract, corn syrup and salt together with a fork. Then start mixing in the powdered sugar. When it gets too stiff to mix with the fork, knead it with your hands. It should form a ball.

   This is where you can get creative. The recipe was to make little mints that look like planets, but making the ring on the Saturn-shaped ones got extremely frustrating, so I just went with T.A.R.D.I.S's and bow ties and fezzes. (again all from Doctor Who). Now just form the fondant into little...well...whatever you want them to be! You could do little turtles, or you could do sporty mints that are shaped like baseballs/soccer balls or something. They should be about the size of a marble or a little bigger. This is how mine turned out.

Let them dry out on the counter overnight or for about 8 hours so that they can harden enough so that when you paint them they won't get all globular and gross. Once you're ready to paint them, you have a few choices about how you want to decorate them.

   You could draw designs on them with Food Decorating Pens. (They're like felt tip markers but the ink inside is replaced with food coloring.) Be careful to press very gently when you do this because if you push too hard you can make dents or holes in the fondant. You can buy them online here or go get some at your local baking supply store.

...or...

You could paint them like I did. You can use gel food coloring or liquid, but gel gives a brighter color, and liquid has a tendency to turn fondant to mush. I'm using gel food coloring for the basic parts, and once it dries I'm drawing the details with a food writer pen.

                                             
           Do a little at a time so that the gel can dry. And so that you don't stain your fingers red like I did :D  Look at the cute little bow ties :) This part takes a while but its worth it.

Once you finish decorating them, eat  them immediately or pop them in the fridge to keep them fresh. Enjoy!