Eating Dinner While Standing in the Kitchen
Ingredients all prepped.
Do you ever have those days where there's a lot going on at work (or wherever you are) and suddenly you realize you have "nothing" to make for dinner? And when I say nothing, I mean very spare ingredients that could make a meal, but not exactly what you're in the mood for and nothing close to being as appetizing as dinner should be after a busy/hectic day of your life. That's a "nothing to eat" situation in our house and that's what happened tonight.
Assembly in the hot pan - getting the tortillas just a little crispy!
We had some veggies, a couple leftovers from earlier in the week, and no fresh protein (old frozen food does not count). Amidst a busy work day, I kept debating a few items we could buy to supplement the existing ingredients, and then it dawned on me: let's make mini quesadillas (thankfully I didn't exclaim this out loud at work because that would have been awkward!). Perhaps that idea is somewhat random, but we did happen to have small GF tortillas and wouldn't need much else to supplement and create the meal. My husband texted me from the grocery store on his way home and we decided to add chicken, avocados, and extra tortillas (I wasn't thrilled with the ones we had). A bit of a discussion once we were both home on how to season and assemble, and we were in business for what would be a delightful (OK, amazing) dinner.
A lovely mini quesadilla, too full to fold!
What I love about the quesadilla is that during the creation of each one, and there were several, you can add/remove whatever fillings you like, making each one completely custom (exactly how I like my food, especially at home). What we didn't realize about making them "to order" was that we had to stand in the kitchen prepping/cooking each one, and then eat them while standing in the kitchen, and then prepping for the next round. And then eating them standing in the kitchen, and then prepping, and so on. We basically turned into our own short order dinner staff. But I have to admit, I've never eaten something so delicious while standing in my kitchen. We should make "standing dinner" more often. :)
I attempted to fold, and it just didn't quite work out. But, delicious nonetheless!
Dinner Notes: For this meal, we used very simple ingredients to make an extremely flavorful meal. And while I said mini-quesadillas, they turned into open-face tacos because well, we put too much filling in each one and could barely fold them in half. So, you can call these whatever you want, but I'm sticking to mini-quesadilla. Tortillas were 100% ground corn organic tortillas made locally in Massachusetts and they were terrific. For fillings, we made cajun chicken ( a little over 1 pound cut into strips and grilled, then chopped up), sautéed veggies (zucchini, onions, mushrooms), guacamole (first, we grilled the avocados!), and shredded cheese. While assembling each one in the hot cast iron pan, we filled them in the following order: cheese, veggies, chicken, a little extra cheese, then salsa and guacamole once taken out of the pan and put on the plate. A delicious dinner whether you choose to eat it standing in the kitchen, or not!
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