Highdesert Stamper – Artistic Inkspirations

Out here in the southwest, we eat Enchiladas. They can be in various forms and with varying ingredients. You can use RED CHILI or GREEN CHILI, beef, chicken, or vegetarian with just cheese  and the regular veggies that goin in enchliadas (onions, pinto beans, etc).  I didn’t have any chicken thawed out, so I made some rolled beef and been enchiladas with GREEN CHILI sauce.  I made them similar to green chili chicken enchiladas with a cream green chili sauce.

Here are some of the stages of building your enchliadas!!

Browning the meat and onions, garlic : I also mixed in the pinto bean mixture to this mix.. to fill the tortillas with…

Green chili sauce (thickened green chili in a little chicken broth), then stir in the cream of chicken soup

Then roll the enchiladas and top with any leftover filling.  I also layered some pieces of left over tortillas on top before topping it with shredded cheese.My tortillas tore a little (I forgot to soak the tortillas in some chicken broth (or even the green chili mix)..so they cracked a bit when I rolled them.. but hey…they all flatten out and soak up all the chili sauce you pour over the whole dish, top it with cheese and bake for 30 mi til hot and bubbly..

final dish

Serve them with a little salad and you have a complete balanced meal!! I even drained all the excess fat off the ground beef when I sauteed it, to reduce the fat in the dish. If you use Xtra SHARP shredded cheese on the top mix, you can add more flavor and use less cheese! Enjoy! ¡Buen provecho

You can make the same dish meatless, just leave out the beef!! Or change it to chicken, turkey.

I’d like to wish all my friends and those who follow my blog, a very Blessed Christmas. This isn’t really the time of year Jesus was born, but it’s become the “traditional Christmas” season to celebrate His Birth.  Here is part of the passage of the birth of the KING from Luke 2: 7-16

And she brought forth her firstborn son, and wrapped him in swaddling clothes, and laid him in a manger; because  there was no room for them in the inn.
And there were in the same country shepherds abiding in the field, keeping watch over their flock by night.
And, lo, the angel of the Lord came upon them, and the glory of the Lord shone round about them: and they were sore afraid.And the angel said unto them, Fear not: for, behold, I bring you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people.For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.
And this [shall be] a sign unto you; Ye shall find the babe wrapped in swaddling clothes, lying in a manger.
And suddenly there was with the angel a multitude of the heavenly host praising God, and saying,
Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men.
And it came to pass, as the angels were gone away from them into heaven, the shepherds said one to another, Let us now go even unto Bethlehem, and see this thing which is come to pass, which the Lord hath made known unto us.And they came with haste, and found Mary, and Joseph, and the babe lying in a manger.

Out here in the Southwest we have lots of unique traditions, from the lighting of the Farolitos or Luminarias, to eating traditional foods only cooked during the Christmas season. Posole is one of those traditional foods. It was originally a dish from Mexico, said to be a cure for hangovers. But here in New Mexico, it’s cooked and eaten around the Christmas season. If you’ve never had any, you’ll just have to come to the Southwest and try some!

So I made my traditional Christmas Posole…for Christmas Eve, something I have done for the past 30 years (I was reminded…and HAD to do it again this year)….. This has become sort of a tradition in my house. I used to have lots of people stop by for a bowl of this wonderous Christmas special. This year we had a few visitors and I put the rest away for later in the year when you get hungry for a bowl of it, but really don’t want to go to the trouble to make it, and most of the year we can’t find the special Posole mix in the stores to make it. So, we had some good food and good friends to share it with. This is my large pot boiling away on the stove…almost ready to eat!!

It’s often served with garnishes such as sour cream, diced avocados, diced green onions, tortilla chips or fresh flour tortillas. So next time you decide to take a trip to the southwest, if you come during the Christmas season, you’ll be able to find this as a “special” on the menu of all the Mexican restaurants in town.

It was still too cold in my stamp room today.. I wanted to get out there and put things away, take some pics, clean off the table, create some new things… but 61 deg and arthritis don’t go too well together. SO I made some Chocolate crescent cookies (very similar to the little Russian tea cakes I used to make only these had chocolate along with all the ground almonds and butter).. and I made some cinnamon rolls. I have been craving cinnamon rolls!! I mixed up my bread dough.. and it took forever to rise… my kitchen was too cold.  So.. after a few hours they doubled, so I started rolling out the dough to make the rolls. I only have a very small space to work, so had to make the rolls in batches.. then put them all on a baking pan and baked them. I finished them off with an Almond glaze instead of the traditional vanilla glaze. The taste reminded me of the “bear claws” we get at a local bakery. But so yummy!!! Here they are.. before they were eaten on!!

They didn’t rise as much as I would have liked… but they sure taste good!! My mail man will be getting a few in his Christmas box of cookies (if there are any left by Monday!!)

I’ll try to go retrieve the photos of my bamboo pages and get them posted later.. so be sure to come back!!

I am also working on new things for a January class. Hearts and Flowers!!