Sunday, March 22, 2009

Mexican Themed Dinner

I love Mexican food, well at least some of it anyway. Normally when we do the pulled pork it is followed by our garbage pizza, this time after seeing a recipe for a cilantro sauce, I thought...why not do pork tacos. I gathered a few recipes from allrecipes.com for a quick side dish as well as the cilantro sauce and off we go for a nice Mexican themed dinner.

We made our taco's using soft taco shells, dabbing on some our cilantro sauce, layering with our pork, and topping off with some cheese. Between the pork and the cilantro sauce the smell was so good. I am eating another one as I type this, home for lunch. I also made fish taco's using cod. I cut the cod up into small pieces, cooked in about a tbsp. of butter and then I sprinkled on some of the Emeril essence I made last week for the shrimp. Daniel liked the pork tacos better while our buddy Denny liked the fish better.


First up, Amy's Cilantro Cream Sauce~

You will need the following ingredients;
1-8 oz. cream cheese, softened
1 tbsp. sour cream
1-7 0z. tomatillo salsa
1 tsp. freshly ground black pepper
1 tsp. celery salt
1/2 tsp. ground cumin
2 tsp. garlic powder
1 bunch fresh cilantro, chopped
1 tbsp. fresh lime juice

Directions:
1.) Combine cream cheese, sour cream, salsa, pepper, celery salt, cumin, garlic powder, cilantro, and lime juice in a blender or food processor. Blend until smooth and creamy.

* I made this sauce using 7 oz. of salsa verde because we were un-able to find any tomatillo salsa. Also I did not use the sour cream in this dish and instead of using fresh lime juice, I used the juice out of the little green bottle.


Second Up, Mexican cornbread salad;
Ingredients:
1-16 oz. package of cornbread mix
1-4 oz. can chopped green chile peppers
2-15 oz. cans pinto beans, drained
1-8 oz. bottle ranch dressing
1 green pepper, chopped
2-15.25 cans whole kernel corn, drained
2 tomatoes
1-3 oz. can bacon bits
8 oz. shredded cheddar cheese
1 bunch green onions, chopped

Directions:
1.) Prepare cornbread mix as directed on the package, adding the can of green chiles. Set aside and allow to cool and then crumble.
2.) Place half of the cornbread in bottom of a large bowl. Evenly layer with 1 can of beans, 1/2 the bottle of dressing, 1/2 chopped bell pepper, 1 can of corn, 1 chopped tomato, 1/2 jar bacon bits, 1/2 package of cheese, and 1/2 of green onions. Repeat layers in same order using remaining ingredients.
3.) Cover and refrigerate 2 hours and serve chilled.

* Now once again I didn't read the directions before beginning this and I didn't add the green chiles to the cornbread mixture, instead I used half the can and added a layer to the first layer of ingredients. Also, I did not add the bacon bits nor did I add the second can of corn...I thought it would have been too much when compared to the amount of other ingredients.

3 comments:

Lissaloo said...

I love cilantro! What a yummy recipe :)

Chocolate Shavings said...

That sounds like the perfect Mexican dinner! And the cilantro cream sounds soo good!

Sheila said...

We love Mexican food, too. One of my daughters hates cilantro (to her it tastes like licorice or something), but I and some of the others LOVE it. I have never used it in a cream sauce; this sounds good.