The BEST Chicken Quesadillas EVER

For Valentines day my boyfriend and I took our puppies to a park and had a picnic. I wanted to bring a finger-food on our picnic to make eating easier with our puppies running around; this is how I came up with this weeks recipe.


I decided on chicken quesadillas. Being that I had never made any, I winged it; and might I say they were DELICIOUS!

What you need:


Chicken Breast Strips (cooked)                                Large Tortillas

  8 oz Shredded Mixed Cheese                                     Avocado

         Sour Cream                                                                    Lime Juice

               Refried Beans                                                                   Salsa

                                              

Pam Non-stick Cooking Spray

How to Prepare:

If chicken is frozen, thaw it. 

Place chicken in a medium bowl. Cut chicken strips into 1/2 inch to inch sized pieces. Mix in entire bag of shredded cheese. Place aside. 

Half avocado and remove seed. Using a spoon, remove avocado from skin and place it in a bowl. 

Mash the avocado with the spoon. It is ok if small chunks of avocado remain. Add 1/2 as much sour cream as there is avocado. Add approximately 2 tablespoons of lime juice to the avocado. 

Lay out 6 tortillas. 

Generously spread avocado paste to 3 of the tortillas (do not put paste on outer inch of tortilla for less mess). 

Generously spread refried beans on the remaining tortillas (do not put beans on outer inch of tortilla for less mess). 

Divide chicken and cheese mixture evenly between tortillas with avocado paste (do not put chicken on outer inch of tortilla for less mess). 

Place tortillas with refried beans on top of the chicken (beans down), forming 3 quesadillas. 

Turn the stove on medium and place a large skillet on the burner. 

When the pan is hot, spray it with Pam (I used Pam's Canola Oil non-stick cooking spray). 

Place 1 quesadilla in the pan and brown both sides, the cheese should be melted. 

Remove quesadilla. 

Spray pan with Pam and add 2nd quesadilla to the pan. Brown both sides, the cheese should be melted.

Remove quesadilla. 

Spray pan with Pam and add 3rd quesadilla to the pan. Brown both sides, the cheese should be melted.

Remove quesadilla. 

Cut each quesadilla into 8 pieces. 

Serve with sour cream and salsa. 

Tips:

You can use fresh chicken if you prefer. Cook it and slice it prior to above steps. 

I needed to use 2 large spatulas to flip my quesadillas. You can make quesadillas with one tortilla apiece by putting avocado paste on 1/2 of the tortilla and refried beans on the other 1/2, place the chicken one of the 1/2s and fold it. I made them with 2 tortillas to speed things up. 

I say serve with sour cream and salsa; however, I found them so yummy that I didn't need the sour cream or salsa. 

ENJOY!

Tomatillo Salsa

Hello, 

According to the "What's in Season" tracker at the top of this page: avocado, red onion, and lime are all currently in season in Florida. This is why the first recipe I have chosen to share with you is a Tomatillo Salsa recipe, which was shared with me by my sister Rachel.

Tomatillo Salsa

You will need the following:

8 Tomatillos                                   2 Avocados

Tomatillos

Avocado

1 Red Onion                            1 Jalapeno         

Red Onion

Jalapenos

& Lime juice

Lime Juice

How to prepare:

Remove the husks from the tomatillos. The skin under the husks will be slightly sticky; this is normal.


Wash the tomatillos and the jalapeno. 

Slice the tomatillos into thin slices then cut these slices into small pea size cubes. Put tomatillo cubes into a medium size bowl.

Cut the avocados in half. Remove the seed from each avocado.

Remove the avocado from its skin. The easiest way to do this is by sliding a spoon between the skin and the avocado.

Cut the avocado into thin slices and then into small pea size cubes, such as was done with the tomatillos. Put the avocado cubes into the bowl with the tomatillos. Mix the avocado into the tomatillos.

Cut the red onion in half. This is added to taste, so start with only one half of the onion. Remove the outer skin, then slice and cube the onion as you did with the tomatillos and avocado. Add this to the bowl of tomatillos and avocado to taste. Mix the onion into the tomatillos and avocado. I usually only use the one half, but you can use more or less according to your taste.

Next, cut the jalapeno into very thin slices. Cut these slices into very small cubes; the smaller the better. Add jalapeno to the mixture to taste. The more jalapeno added the hotter the salsa will be.

After all of the ingredients are mixed, mix in some lime juice to keep the salsa fresh. I usually add about a tablespoon or two.

Store in the fridge.

Tomatillo Salsa

Tips:

This salsa usually tastes best after sitting in the fridge for a day. This allows all of the flavors to mix. 

To speed things up, I use a Vidalia Chop Wizard to cube the tomatillos, avocado, and onion slices, and a Pampered Chef chopper to dice the jalapeno slices.

Vidalia Chop Wizard

Pampered Chef Chopper

Similar choppers can be found at stores such as: WalMart, Target, Bed Bath and Beyond, and similar stores.

ENJOY!