Mexican To Feed The Surprise Crowd

In life, there are times when we have certain surprises that come up. You might be planning a nice dinner with your family during the big game and suddenly you have a house full of people. This can cause a headache for you, if you are unprepared. Thankfully, Mexican food offers a solution that can feed a large group of people and keep them coming back for more.

Let's take a look at a very easy dish that can feed that hungry crowd!

Spicy Chicken Enchiladas

What You Need

1 whole chicken shredded
1 cup green onions, diced fine
1 minced garlic clove
1 tablespoon butter
1 large can stewed tomatoes
18oz can tomato sauce
1 can diced green chilies
½ teaspoon sugar
1 ½ teaspoons cumin
½ teaspoon salt
¾ teaspoon oregano
¾ teaspoon dried basil
18 corn or flour tortillas
1 cup sour cream
3 cups shredded cheese
1 can black olives

How to Make It

Now that you have ingredients, you need to get them mixed together. Take the onion and begin to cook it in a frying pan with onion. When they become translucent, add in tomato sauce, chilies, sugar, basil, the tomatoes, and other seasonings. Heat it to a slight boil and then turn it down until it is just simmering. Be sure to turn n your over to 350 degrees.

Next, place each tortilla into the sauce you just made and fill it with chicken, cheese and other items until they are stuffed. Roll it and place it into a glass baking dish. Keep going through this process until you have stuffed your dish full. Pay close attention to rolling each of these, Mexican food can easily come undone if you do not tuck it properly.

Take your remaining sauce and smother the top of all your enchiladas and then shove them in the over for 30 minutes. Now, sprinkle a layer of cheese on top and bake for an additional 10 minutes. When that is done, pull them out, slap down a dollop of sour cream and salsa on top and be prepared to satisfy the needs of your hungry guests.

If you want to take your Mexican food to the next level, think about the sides you are going to be adding to it as well. You might want to add a few cans of refried beans and even rice to the mixture. This will allow you to feed more people during this time than if you severed the main course only.

While you are experimenting with this dish, another idea would be to add jalapenos to the mix. This is especially good in cases where you want a little heat added in to bring out the most flavors possible.

Remember, one of the nice things about Mexican food is you can feed a number of people on a small budget. Making it by far the best option when you are gathering a crowd in your home, plus everyone loves it!

Cooking Tips for College Kids: Ramen Surprise

Okay, so you're 18 and on your own. You just moved out of your parents' house, left state and are in a new city with new people and a new college where you have no idea how to clean yourself, clothe yourself, or more importantly feed yourself. I was there, and I spent two plus years trying to figure out how to pull it off before I fell into a decent routine that kept me breathing day in and day out.

But, let's not forget the most important pieces. You're poor, you're probably living with a bunch of other people and you have no idea how to cook a damn anything. When your parents were preparing dinner you were entrenched in a pile of dirty clothes watching music videos or playing grand theft auto. Do you even own a pot?

Not a problem. There are a few basic things that anyone can put together with the willingness to spend a few minutes preparing and actually mixing ingredients together.

Your first recipe: Ramen Surprise
When you think of Ramen noodles, you think dry, full of salt and often too hot and soupy. They're good but, they give you heartburn and cause dehydration. Well, these little noodly saviors are more than just a 120% of your daily allotment of sodium. They're cheap as hell and extremely filling. But, you don't have to eat them as is.

Head to the cheapest, biggest grocery store you can find and pick up ten of the little guys for a dollar, or if you're really lucky they'll be on sale for 20/$1. That's five cents a piece for a full meals worth of noodles.
First off get rid of the seasoning packet. That's where your salt comes from, and you can do better without it. Trust me. Whenever you open a packet, chuck that thing in the trash. Now, you have a brick of hard egg noodle goodness. And with this lovely building block, you can go ahead and start your meal.

First, boil it up and get those noodles ready to eat. Now, in another pan (or a bowl in a microwave if you're in a dorm and sans cooking materials) sauté up some vegetables (gasp, vegetables?...yes) with butter or olive oil. Olive oil is expensive as hell, so you might want to stick with the butter, but don't get carried away. Basically you throw butter in a pan with some broccoli and carrots, or whatever other easy, bagged vegetables you can find and turn it to medium, medium high and cook them until they're soft. Takes 5 minutes at the most.

Now, take your noodles, and throw in your vegetables....that's it.

Don't complain about the meat being gone, because you're not getting meat in those nasty seasoning packets either. Of course, if you're feeling especially energetic, toss a few pieces of chicken in there. Chicken's more or less the cheapest meat you're going to find, so it's the way to go with almost every meal.

The total cost of the meal: Ramen - 10 cents; Vegetables - $1; butter - 50 cents; chicken - $1

Vegetarian = $1.60

Meat = $2.60

It's a wee bit cheaper than the usual junk from McDonald's, and not quite as pain inducing as straight up ramen. Next up: spicing up Macaroni and Cheese.