Increasingly-Popular Mexican Stuffed Shells

Mexican Stuffed Shells are featured so often on Pinterest that I have no idea who originated this delicious recipe. One special change I made was to substitute Boca Veggie Ground Crumbles for my vegetarian daughter. This entree would be equally delicious with ground beef or ground turkey.

My son-in-law is a diehard carnivore but even he went back for seconds! Grandson No. 1 -- age 10 -- is an omnivore, as he puts it. We’ve recently come to realize that my 6-year old grandson is (going to be) a vegetarian. He barely touches meat and he likes most of his foods uncooked. I’m glad to know that both of them -- all 4 of them as a matter of fact -- love their salads and vegetables.

Grandma -- that’s me -- will eat most anything. That’s the way I was raised, but I find as I get older (I do that regularly) I prefer less meat and more veggies. Right now my daughter and I are in the midst of a modified Paleo diet. Meaning we’re pretty much restricting ourselves to meat, veggies and fruit. Because she’s a vegetarian, she ends up adding beans and some grains to her diet to meet her caloric and nutritional needs. I add some dairy because I never ate/drank much of it in the first place, but probably need what I can get to avoid osteoporosis.


Back to the recipe

MEXICAN STUFFED SHELLS
(Serves 5-6)

Ingredients...

1-pound ground beef or ground turkey
1 package taco seasoning
4 ounces cream cheese
18 jumbo pasta shells
1-1/2 cups salsa
1 cup taco sauce
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 cup shredded Monterey Jack cheese
3 green onions, chopped
1/4 - 1/3 cup pitted black olives, cut in quarters
Sour cream

Instructions...

1. Preheat oven to 350-degrees Fahrenheit.
2. In a pan, brown the meat; add taco seasoning and prepare according to package directions.
3. Add cream cheese to meat mixture; cover and simmer until cheese is melted. Stir together and mix well. Cool thoroughly.
4. While meat is cooking, cook pasta according to package directions. Drain. Rinse with cold water. Drain. Set shells on pan or large plate with space between so they don’t stick together.
5. Pour salsa on bottom of a baking pan.
6. Stuff each shell with 1 - 2 tablespoons of the meat mixture. Place them in the pan, open side up.
7. Evenly cover shells with taco sauce.
8. Cover with foil and bake thirty (30”) minutes.
9. Remove foil and sprinkle with onions, olives and shredded cheeses.
10. Bake 10” - 15” more (leave foil OFF), until cheeses melt and mixture is just starting to bubble.
11. Serve with sour cream. If desired, serve with more chopped onions, shredded lettuce and diced tomatoes. Oh, and maybe more salsa!

NOTES:

* Since I was feeding carnivores (meat-eaters) and vegetarians, I substituted Boca Frozen Veggie Ground Crumbles (prepared as directed on package) and everyone was satisfied.
* My daughter had made an ATK (America’s Test Kitchen) recipe the day before and gave me her homemade taco seasoning from that entree. I used it and was happy with the results.
* I used mild salsa and mild taco sauce. Next time I may up the heat a notch in one or the other.
* Recipes I saw called for a 9-inch by 13-inch pan. No! Go smaller so that the finished, stuffed shells touch each other.
* I prefer full-fat cream cheese and sour cream!


Can you believe, next month -- September 2013 -- will be the two year anniversary of Step by Step in the Kitchen. And, I’ll be having my 68th birthday. Love it! You’re never too old for anything... blogging, whatever.

Maybe my creeping-up advanced age is what accounts for the fact that I only got one picture of these marvelous Mexican Stuffed Shells. Or, maybe it was the expected dinner company that threw me off.

So, the pictures are from the next day when I was having leftovers. I duplicated the one and cropped it this way and that, so now there are three views of the same photo! Sorry there’s not more, but check online and like I said, you’ll find lots of versions of this recipe and many great pics.

Last but not least, I hope you'll take a few minutes to visit my other blog, CORNING NY STEP BY STEP -- a view of the city where I live.

CORNING NY STEP BY STEP is now on Facebook. LIKE it and you’ll see when I post a new entry to that blog, plus there will be extra photos of people, places and things of Corning, New York that didn’t make it into the blog itself.

Jackpot! Corn on the Cob, Ginger Peach Slaw, Two Smoothies and a Sandwich

I’m back from vacation and back to cooking. So much stockpiled on Pinterest and dying to be tested and tried.


CORN ON THE COB

Although all five recipes are super and the results are guaranteed to show up in my house again, I’ve got to start out by spotlighting the Corn on the Cob from Instructables.

I’m not talking about the taste. You can minimize with butter, salt and butter. You can doctor up the cooked corn with whatever fancy toppings your heart so desires.

Instead, m’dears, it’s about the ease of preparing the corn. That's right ~ Instructables is giving you step by step directions for the easiest way in the world to remove the husk and corn silk. Here’s how...

Needed:
Corn on the cob, husk and silk still attached
Oven mitts
Large sharp knife
Cutting Board

Place the corn in your microwave, just as it is ~ just as you brought it home from the supermarket or the farmers’ market or, better yet, your garden. Nuke it for 4 - 5 minutes. Remove it from the microwave, wearing oven mitts. Immediately lay it on a cutting board and cut off one-inch from the thick end of the cob.

Now hold it up in the air by the narrow end (still wearing oven mitts ‘cause it’s hot!). With your other mitted hand, squeeze the cob down and out of the husks. When I did this, I found two -- can you believe that, only two -- pieces of corn silk on my corn on the cob.

Time to eat and absolutely no mess to clean up! Oh my, where was this genius idea all those years when I was fighting with corn silks??




PEACH GINGER SLAW

The grands (ages 5 & 9) came over for dinner soon after I returned. They eat most anything I cook and although the bigger one wanted to make pancakes (we’ll save that for a future date!), I forced them to be my official testers for several ideas, including this Peach Ginger Slaw from Beth at eat. drink. smile.

Pecans, Pepper Jelly, Rice Vinegar, Sesame Oil, Fresh Ginger, Canola Oil, Coleslaw Mix, Salt & Pepper, Fresh Peaches. Aren’t you drooling just reading those ingredients?!

Here are two simple changes I made to Peach Ginger Slaw...

1. Super hot weather these past few weeks made me hesitant to turn on the oven to bake the pecans. Instead, I toasted them in a dry, non-stick pan over a low heat. Watch them carefully and shake the pan often. (After you chop them, carefully separate them from any powdery crumbs as those will burn in the pan. OR, toast them before chopping.)

2. With no rice vinegar in the house, I checked the Internet and found that I could substitute champagne vinegar (which I had) for the mild rice vinegar.

How much did the boys like the Peach Ginger Slaw? The little one doesn’t eat a lot of anything, but the older one took home a container of it, plus a paper cupful that he was eating as he went out the door.

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Although I forgot to take photos, I did prepare other foods for the boys, including Asparagus Pesto Grilled Cheese Sandwiches from the grilled cheese guru, Kevin at Closet Cooking.

Prepare the simple Asparagus Pesto, then assemble and grill the sandwich which includes a whole grain bread, butter, Wisconsin Gruyere (I used Swiss) and some of the pesto.

Delizioso!

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PICK ME UP PINA COLADA

Cory at Zesty Cook has come out with a brand new e-book full of healthy, tasty smoothies and I tried out the Pick Me Up Pina Colada. Absolutely yummy and refreshing.

Ingredients: Coconut Milk, Baby Spinach, Banana, Fresh Mint, Pineapple Chunks, Ice Cubes, Flax Seed

The slightly raggedy looking mint at the top of the picture is from my garden!




PINEAPPLE GINGER SMOOTHIE

Last but not least, I decided to make a simple smoothie using fresh pineapple leftover from the Pina Colada and fresh ginger leftover from preparing the Ginger Peach Slaw.

I pinned this recipe from gimme some oven on my Pinterest account and was anxious to try it out. Another simple one, using ingredients I often have on hand:

Fresh Pineapple, Banana, Greek Yogurt, Fresh Ginger, Ice, Pineapple Juice or Water.


One small change I'll probably make in the future is to cut the fresh ginger quantity from 1 Tablespoon down to 1 teaspoon. For me, a tablespoon seemed too much when I read the quantity and it was too gingery for me in taste.

All in all, a very tasty smoothie!


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Now that the weather is finally cooling (really, anything is cooler than 90+ and 100+ degrees Fahrenheit), I can’t wait to get back to baking. On my agenda--Brown Butter Hazelnutella Chip Cookies from my friend Chocolate Chip Uru at Go Bake Yourself.