Tacos With Recycled Chicken

Chicken Tacos With Recycled Grilled Chicken

Last weekend was another busy weekend in our devastated neighborhood. For the past week, all of our dinners were late dinners, with about twelve or fourteen people at my tables. Everyone was weary each night, after a day of clean-up and bleaching. You wouldn't believe the mess that was left behind from the flood. 

Our dinners consisted of lots of food and over the last few days, we accumulated an assortment of leftovers. Sunday night was leftover night. We had leftover lasagna, pasta with lamb, cheesy pasta, grilled sausages and a giant salad. 

I also had two large grilled chicken leg quarters which needed to be used up. I decided to make tacos with them. 

While I normally mix my own seasonings,  we had two packages of Lawry’s Taco Seasoning and, I must say, it was quite good. I had a few bottles of lime flavored light beer too. I consider light lime flavored beer to be undrinkable, and it seems that I always have a bottle or two, that people leave behind. This was a good use for one of them. Here’s what I did.

Chicken from 2 large leg quarters,

chopped (about 3 cups)

Olive oil

1 medium onion

1 large jalapeño, chopped

2 packages of Lawry’s Taco Seasoning

1bottle of light lime beer

1 lime, cut into wedges

1 package of large flour tortillas

Preparation

Heat a large cast iron skillet until it is hot. Add enough olive oil to coat the bottom. Add the chopped chicken and stir. Add the onion and jalapeño. Let that cook for about five minutes, stirring often. Squeeze half of the lime over the chicken and stir.

Stir in the taco seasoning until it is well mixed. Add the bottle of beer, stir and bring it to a simmer. Let that simmer until most of the liquid is reduced. Place the chicken mix into a bowl and rinse out your cast iron pan. Dry it and heat it over medium high heat for about five minutes, so it is hot and available to heat the tortillas as people serve themselves.

Serving

Have each person heat their own tortillas about 20 seconds per side and then place it on their plate. Direct them to add chicken, lettuce, cheese and hot taco sauce to the chicken. Squeeze on a little lime juice and roll it up like a burrito.

Along with the tacos, have them take some lasagna, pasta, chile, lamb chops and some sausage. Open several bottles of wine and slice the homemade bread. 

You know, there is one thing about this dinner that confuses me. We served a bunch of leftover food and yet, somehow, we ended up with more leftovers than we started with. It’s a miracle.