Getting back to Good Better Best Food basics today with a recipe for baked chicken tacos. I have now made twice in the last two weeks. Just writing about them here makes me totally crave these tacos. This recipe is easy, versatile, and makes a lot of food. With this recipe, depending on how many people you have, you might be able to cook once and eat twice. What could be Better?
If you have been reading Good Better Best for a while, you may have noticed I am not much of a crockpotter...meaning, I don't use it in my cooking all that much. In thinking about coming up with my own version of baked tacos, I did follow the method of slow cooking the chicken in the crockpot from Shay Shull. Shay says she typically uses just water but as you will see below, I used chicken stock and it added a lot of flavor to the chicken. Cooking the chicken this way makes it so tender and it could not be easier.
Ok, let's get to the Goods.
Ingredients
2-3 lbs boneless chicken breasts
1 carton chicken stock
1 packet of taco seasoning per pound (I did two packets for two pounds)
1 can of black beans
1 can of corn
1 packet of shredded cheese
non-stick cooking spray
1 table spoon of cooking oil
1 package of taco shells (Stand and Stuff work really well)
Prepare the chicken
-Place chicken breasts in your crock pot
-Cover with chicken stock until they are just covered on the top
-Cover crockpot with lid
-Cook for 4 hours if fresh or 6-8 hours if frozen
***Note I have tried both ways and they are both great
Prep for Tacos
-When the chicken is cooked, carefully take of of the crockpot and place on cutting board to cool a little bit. The chicken will be very tender so be careful transferring it as it may start to separate.
-Spray an 8 x 8 baking dish with non-stick cooking spray and place tacos shells in the pan
-Heat oven to 400 degrees
-Drain corn and put in small bowl
-Drain and rinse beans and put in small bowl
Prep Taco Meat
-Shred chicken on cutting board
-Heat oil in a large pan
-Add chicken and mix to just coat in oil
-Add taco seasoning and water as directed on package and simmer down the sauce
Assemble Tacos
-There are two ways you can do this depending on everyone's tastes.
-The easiest way to do this is mix the taco meat, black beans and corn together in a large bowl.
-Since Hockey Guy didn't want corn in his, I just mixed smaller portions together in a bowl as pictured above and then filled the shells based on what people wanted.
-The option in our house was either corn, black beans and chicken or just chicken and black beans. You could also just do black beans and corn.
-Fill the taco shells with filling.
-Top with shredded cheese.
-Bake for 10 minutes until the cheese is melted.
-Top with all of your favorite taco toppings such as shredded lettuce, salsa, guacamole and sour cream.
Sheet Pan Nachos (if you have leftovers)
-You can get a snack, appetizer or even another meal if you have leftover ingredients.
-Heat oven to 400 degrees
-Cover a cookie sheet with foil and spray with cooking spray
-Spread tortilla chips on the pan
-Cover with chicken, black beans and corn
-Top with shredded cheese
-Bake 8-10 minutes
-Top with salsa, black olives, guacamole and sour cream
To make Better add one element of organic chicken, organic chicken stock, or organic black beans. To make Best add multiple elements of organic chicken, organic chicken stock, or organic black beans.
Enjoy the Best tacos!
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