Quick Tasty Food: Salsa Chicken Pasta

Who doesn't love salsa? Who doesn't love chicken? ... Ok, not everyone likes them. Obviously those people won't like this recipe. I, on the other, loved this random creation. I had the brilliant idea to marinate chicken in salsa. I grabbed a Hot Salsa from Whole Foods that was on sale and then grabbed a pound of chicken. Cut the chicken up into pieces (I went for half inch cubes). Cover the chicken in the salsa and marinate. How long? Depends. I sort of forgot about it so it marinated for almost 2 days and turned out great. In other words, marinate for however long you think is adequate, with at least a suggestion of an hour.

I then dumped the chicken and salsa in a skillet set to medium heat. I also decided to make some pasta so I had a small pot going of that. After a few minutes, turn the chicken pieces to make sure both sides cook. Once the pasta was done, I added it to the chicken salsa.

I also decided it needed more veggies than what was in the salsa. I wanted to go with a can of corn but all I had was cream corn which likely would not have been very great addition. Thus, I went with French style green beans. Dump the whole can (drained, of course) in with the chicken salsa pasta.

After that I realized that I likely made the wrong choice with the hot salsa as there was a definite spicy smell coming from the skillet. I added maybe a half cup of Mexican cheese, yet you can obviously go with whatever cheese you want. I just had some Mexican on hand because I had planned to make some Taco Cupcakes.

And it does make a lot. I ate this for 1 dinner and 2 lunches, feeling satisfied each meal.

You can also make several variations of those. You can make it "traditional" by using pasta sauce instead of salsa. Add more veggies or don't add veggies at all. Cutting carbs, don't add the pasta. Yada yada yada, on it goes.

You can also take just the salsa chicken and make it into loaded nachos by cutting the chicken up into smaller pieces and serving it over nachos with whatever other regular nacho additions you want. This is actually a great idea I may have to make at some point. Hmmm....

Quick Tasty Food: Naan Pizza

I love naan and find it very versatile. My favorite use is to make pizza with it. One single leaf of naan is perfect for a personal pizza and you can top it with anything a normal pizza has. And naan is much healthier than normal dough and (in my opinion) better quality.

Tonight, for example, I made a BBQ Chicken Naan Pizza. The other day I got a rotisserie chicken to eat throughout the week ($6 is a great deal for all the meat you can get off it, just takes patience to rip it to pieces). Take some chicken, mix it with a bit of sauce (tonight I went with a variety of Sriracha, Sweet BBQ, and Light Blue Cheese Dressing). Chop up some veggies that work with the type you're going with (red onions and celery go perfect with BBQ Chicken). Sprinkle a bit of cheese (Italian Five Cheese was great but I used it up on my last naan pizza, so today I went with slices of Swiss that I chopped up to resemble shredded cheese). Bake it at 400 degrees Fahrenheit until it's as done as you want (I like it crispy but soft). Voila, you have a naan pizza!

Other varieties:
- Reddit user gamergrl1018 suggested a Martguerita naan pizza with olive oil, garlic, thyme, fresh basil, tomato, and mozzarella
- Cincinnati Chili with oyster crackers and cheddar cheese; can add in onions and beans or chopped up hot dogs
- Hawaiian with pineapple chunks and capicola ham/Canadian bacon; can add on onions

Quick Tasty Food: Pumped Up Mac & Cheese

I don't always cook normal food, sometimes I create a tasty dish while I'm cooking one main item. Weird, I know. And a lot of the time the dish looks downright disgusting! Yet I know it's going to be good, I just know it. A very small percentage of the time does the dish end up nasty and most of the time that's when I'm eating it as leftovers.

Tonight I made something that looked bad but tasted fantastic. The ingredients:

• Kraft Garlic & Herb Alfredo Mac & Cheese
• can of French Style Green Beans, drained
• Sriracha Chili Sauce
• bullion  powder (I used low-salt chicken flavor)
• 1 egg
• Blue Cheese Dressing (I used light but you can use regular blue cheese chunks as well)
• Milk

1. Use the Kraft recommended amount of water and put in a bit of the bullion powder.
2. While the water is beginning to boil, I squirted in some Sriracha. You can be the judge of the amount you use based on how spicy you like your dishes. I like it nice and spicy so I did 2 big squirts.
3. After the water has boiled, dump in the macaroni and green beans. Let boil again.
4. After it has come to a boil, crack the egg and drop it straight in the water. No need to cook it ahead of time as the boiling water cooks it for you.
5. After it has cooked for the normal amount of time, strain and put the mixture back in the pot but do not put it on the stove again.
6. Put in the Kraft powder, the milk (follow the directions if you want, I just guestimated the amount), and a tablespoon of blue cheese dressing (or regular blue cheese crumble).
7. Return to the stove and heat on low, if possible you can let it boil again for a little bit. Make sure to continue stirring so everything is mixed together.
8. After a minute or two, you're done. Remove from heat and put in your dish of choice.

Remember, it's going to look nasty but will taste wonderful! You have a good amount of fiber from the green beans, a good amount of protein from the egg and milk. Not saying it's healthy for you, but for something that you literally just throw together it works fine. Plus, it definitely fills you up!