Fiesta Chicken Wraps

I don't update my blog for months, and now twice in one day. Amazing what a little free time can do.

I'll make this one short and sweet. I discovered this recipe on, you guessed it, Pinterest! I had made these before, but I don't think I posted the recipe.

Here is the link for Crispy Southwest Chicken Wraps by Mel's Kitchen Cafe.

Here is her recipe with my substitutions/omissions:

• 1 cup rice (I cooked in a rice cooker. It yielded 2 cups cooked.)
• 1 cup cooked, shredded chicken 
• 1 can pinto beans, rinsed and drained
• 1 green onion, finely sliced (white and green parts)
• 1/2 red pepper, diced
• 1/4 cup fresh cilantro, chopped
• juice of 1 lime
• 1/2 tablespoon chili powder
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic salt
• shredded cheese (I used a mex cheese blend)
• Sour cream (optional)
• 6 burrito-sized flour tortillas

           1. Cook 1 cup rice with 2 cups water in a rice cooker. Then drain and rinse pinto beans. In a small skillet, soften the diced red peppers. Add the pinto beans. Cook together until the beans are warm. 

• "2. Mix rice together with chili powder and garlic salt. Add remaining ingredients except for cheese and sour cream. Sprinkle cheese over tortillas, leaving 1/2-inch border around edges, then arrange chicken and rice mixture down the center of each tortilla.Roll stuffed tortillas, leaving edges open and slightly flatten the wraps with the palm of your hand. 
• 
  
• 3. Heat a large non-stick skillet (or griddle) over medium heat for 1 minute. Arrange wraps, seam-side down, in pan or griddle and cook until golden brown and crisp, about 2-3 minutes per side. Cooking them seam-side down first helps seal the long edge so they don’t fall apart. Transfer to a plate and repeat with remaining wraps. Serve warm."

Oven Cleaning Semi-Magic

It seems like it has been forever since I've blogged. I suppose I could have blogged about my classroom, which was awesome. Alas, there was no time for that while I was planning for 3-4 grade levels a week. Eek! I wouldn't have had it any other way. Since summer is here, I can once again (attempt) to update my blog with my amazing recipes and cleaning tips. My latest and greatest scheme has, of course, been discovered on Pinterest. I've been pinning and liking things for months that I have been unable to try. I rediscovered this one the other day and have finally had the time to give it a shot. Now, as much as I love pinterest and all of the "you can do that???" moments, I have learned that the grass isn't always greener on the other side.

...but this... THIS is an amazing thing. Some of you may be reading this and thinking one of the following: Who cleans the oven? Doesn't the oven clean itself? I thought I had to 'season' the oven...hmmm. I only use the oven for holidays. Or, my favorite, Why would I even need to use the oven when I have a microwave?

Cleaning the oven is no easy feat, and when I saw this "miracle" cleaning brew, I giggled to myself and thought... yeah right, like that is going to work. I decided to just try it on the oven door. In my almost 3 decades of life, I've learned a few things about myself. One is that I need to start small. No more pulling everything out of the closet to organize, because by the time everything is out, I'm over closet cleaning. Then it's worse than when I started.

The last time I decided to clean the oven, I had to leave the house for the entire day. I had purchased easy off oven cleaner. I knew the original one had a strong aroma...strong enough to take down a full grown grizzly bear if one had decided to come into my house, so I decided to purchase the unscented one. People, the unscented one is probably unscented, because by the time you spray your entire oven your nasal hair is burnt to a crisp and you can't smell anything for 2 weeks. AND it doesn't even work that well. Granted I wiped it out sooner than I should have, but hey, I was convinced that it had eaten through the top layer of oven coating.

Other oven cleaning miracle cleaners have included amonia or the self cleaning oven function built into the oven. After the issue with easy off, I quickly scratched amonia off the list, along with the self cleaning because my oven doesn't have that feature. If your oven does have that option, be careful! There are studies that show heating teflon coating up past 700-900 degrees can emit toxic fumes into your home.

So, now that I've fully explained how I ended up getting to today, I'll let you in on my borrowed oven cleaning semi-magic recipe. Folks, it actually works!

Mix together: baking soda, water, and dawn dish soap. I originally used the dawn with olay that I usually use for my dishes. That worked pretty well when I spot tested the magic brew, so I went out and bought the original, blue, degreaser version of Dawn. It works MUCH better. Mix it up until it has the consistency of buttercream frosting. Then slather it on with a brush or sponge. The original recipe said to let it sit for a few hours and spray with water occasionally; however, my oven has a lot of vents and that option didn't work for me. I let it sit for about 30 minutes and used a scratch free scrubby sponge. I didn't have to do much scrubbing, because most of it wiped right off! Be careful of the little holes and vents in the oven. You don't want to clog those up.

And there you have it folks. The best, non toxic, oven cleaner I've ever used.

You can probably try it with just baking soda and water, but the dish soap REALLY helps cut through the grease quickly.

Disclaimer: Is it going to get off every little spec? No. It will get off the majority of the grease. If you scrub enough, they will probably come off. It worked on my oven door, but I'm too small to scrub the back wall of the oven well enough to get it all off.

Before

 Marinating in le brew

 Wiped it off (After on the left, before on the right)

Wiped it off

 I didn't scrub the top at all. Just rinsed it off.

Definitely looks better than before. Not bad for 30 minutes of marinating and 5-10 minutes of wiping/scrubbing.