Steak Fajitas

On a more serious note…           This dish, on the other hand (as opposed to the last post), graces our table quite often.
Even the kids love it… at the end I’ll show you how to make it kid-friendly!
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Did you ever have steaks on the grill?
They were just delicious, but you had 1 steak leftover… now, what to do with it.????  If you keep it, it might get tough when you reheat it.  If you throw it away, it might bug you that something you spent good money one just went in the trash.  Here’s what I do: Slice it thin and put it in a bag in the freezer. Then, the next time you make fajitas, pull it out and add it to the other meat.

Steak Fajitas

1 lb or so of thinly-sliced steak (I either buy it thinly sliced or slice a couple steaks up. If I have any left over from grilling, I add that too.)
1/3 each of a green, yellow, orange, and sweet red pepper, sliced into strips (Or 2 or 3 colors, whatever you have on hand.) 
1/2 of an onion, sliced and separated
Tortillas
Shredded lettuce (I don’t keep shredded lettuce on hand, I just cut it thinly off of a head of lettuce.)
Tomatoes, cut up
Shredded cheese
Sour cream
Salsa

Spray the skillet with cooking spray or use oil, depends on if you want it more healthy or not. I’ve done it both ways.  Add the steak, peppers, and onion. Sprinkle with some salt and pepper and seasoning. I use Chef Paul Prudhomme’s Meat Magic seasoning .
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About 15 minutes before serving time, turn skillet to about 300. Cover. Stir about every 3 minutes. Fry for about 12 minutes total or until it looks done. While it’s frying, get the other things around… cut the tomatoes, shred the lettuce, etc. Stack tortillas on a plate with a paper towel between each one. Microwave until warm and soft, about a minute or so.
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Now you’re ready to eat! How’s that for a ready-in-15-minutes meal! …which is one reason why I like it. If your supper time varies (like ours does), you can get everything cut up and in the skillet awhile, then it’s pretty fast from there. And now, for the kid-friendly version… Cut 3 1/2″ circles out of a tortilla. 
 
Fill it and roll up.
Fits in their hands nice and works great,
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until they start playing with it!
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There are a bunch of different variations to making fajitas, I’m sure. We don’t have the fried rice and refried beans and guacomole (ok, I can’t make that word look right, where’s my dictionary?!). All that stuff would make it more complicated, plus we don’t really like 2 or 3 of those things.

Tweaked until it got right…

This recipe originated out of the Derstine cookbook. I thought it was sorta blah, so I tweaked it here and there and now that my recipe is all marked up with a pen and pencil, I’ll try to make sense of it and put it in print! I barely ever make casseroles because I married a ‘meat & potatoes’ guy, but the 2 exceptions of all-in-one meals for us are: this lasagna and wet burritos. I almost always make the lasagna for carry-in at church. Once in awhile I make El Paso casserole, which I plan to feature sometime. I don’t like when my group is on for hot dish… I’m way more in my comfort zone with salad & dessert! That’s why I always make the same hotdish! 

Kay’s Lasagna     … this fits perfectly in a large crockpot (I don’t know the size, but I have a little one and a big one. The inside comes out of the big one.)

16 oz noodles  …For the crockpot, sometimes I cook and cut up lasagna noodles, sometimes I use rigatoni or some other noodles. When I layer it to bake in the oven, I always use whole lasagna noodles.
1 1/2 lbs. hamburger
1/2 of an onion
1/2 tsp. Italian seasoning, more if using mozz cheese instead of Italian
5 1/2 c. speghetti sauce
2 c. ricotta cheese
About 2 lbs. shredded Italian or mozzarella cheese
Parmesan cheese

Cook noodles. Brown hamburger and onion; add speghetti sauce and Italian seasoning. Simmer 10 minutes.

For crockpot:
Layer in this order:
1/3 of meat mixture
1/3 of noodles
Sprinkle a little salt over noodles
1/3 ricotta cheese
At least 8 oz shredded cheese
A good amount of Parmesan cheese
Then, I press down on it a little bit. Weird, yeah, but I do it so that after it cooks down, the crockpot is still full. Repeat layers 2 more times. The lid will easy fit on, but the crockpot will be VERY full. Turn it on HI till you leave for church, plug it in at church, still on HI… and I don’t know what the food committee does with it from there!

This takes me about exactly an hour from the time I walk into the kitchen till the time it’s all in the crockpot and the kitchen cleaned up again. I do it Sunday morning, once every other month, usually from about 7:15 to 8:15.

For oven:
Same layer order as crockpot, but only 2 layers instead of 3. Bake at 375 for 40 minutes or until cheese is starting to brown… less if you don’t like your cheese browning.

This lasagna freezes well. When I make it, I put it in smaller pans, then it’s so handy to pull out on a busy day or on Sunday morning before going out the door.

The only pictures I have are of one time when I made a double batch for hot lunch at sewing and then took out enough for us to put in a smaller pan for supper. So here they are:     lasagna3   lasagna4  lasagna5   lasagna6  Repeat layers.

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Also that evening, I made a new breadstick recipe. This one will need a bit of tweaking too.

Italian-Style Breadsticks … from an Easy to Bake Easy to Make recipe card

1/2 cup shredded mozzarella cheese
2 Tbsp. chopped fresh basil or 2 tsp. dried basil
1 tsp. garlic powder
1 tsp. chopped fresh oregano or 1/2 tsp. dried oregano
1/8 tsp. black pepper
1 can (11 oz) refrigerated breadstick dough
1 egg
1 Tbsp. water

Preheat oven to 375. Spray baking sheet with cooking spray. Combine first 5 ingredients in a small bowl; mix well and set aside. Unroll dough; separate breadsticks. Cut each strip in half crosswise.
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On a lightly floured surface, with floured fingertips, twist the 2 halves together. Beat egg w\ water. Lightly brush tops of breadsticks with egg mixture.
bsticks2 (Side note: On this picture, can you tell that my photographer is about 3 1/2 ft. tall? Can almost see the breadsticks!   Also, yeah, that’s a sweater… hard to imagine in this hot weather. This is from a backlog of recipes/pictures not featured yet, but made earlier this year.)
Sprinkle seasoning over breadsticks, turning to coat evenly on both sides. Place breadsticks on baking sheet, 1 inch apart.
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Press down edges slightly to prevent twists from unraveling. Bake until golden brown, about 15 minutes. Serve warm.
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WAY TOO MUCH seasoning!!!!! Next time I’m going to try just sprinkling some Italian seasoning on them over the cheese instead. We could hardly eat them. But man, they sure looked good!!!

                          ————————————————————————

Thanks for all your entertaining/interesting comments in the last post! And I’ll just leave you with a couple things coming in the next posts… Redneck Pizza (designed by my husband) and Steak Fajitas… which one should I feature first?

A Meat & Potatoes Meal

Parmesan Potatoes
Glazed Meat Loaf
Salad
Crescent Rolls
mp meal

Parmesan Potatoes   …This recipe was given to me by my friend Karen from MS. She said it’s one of their favorites and I can see why, esp the top layer! Her husband does a lot of grilling, too. Thanks for the recipe, Karen! (She doesn’t have a site, but she visits here.  )

4 medium potatoes, thinly sliced, peeled too
1 sm onion, thinly sliced in rings (Karen said she doesn’t add quite that much, so I didn’t either)
3 T. butter, melted
1/4 c. grated parmesan cheese
1/4 tsp. salt, pepper, 1/8 tsp. garlic powder (Karen said ‘or seasonings of choice’, but I used these)

Place 1/2 of the potatoes in greased pan (9×13 or smaller).
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Top with onion rings

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and remaining potatoes; drizzle with butter. Sprinkle with parmesan and seasonings.
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Bake uncovered at 450 for 25 min or until potatoes are soft and brown.

Very good!!! Will definitely make again! I made a half batch so we wouldn’t have leftovers.

Glazed Meat Loaf   …This recipe comes from the 2006 Taste of Home Annual Cookbook.

2 eggs, beaten
2/3 c. milk
1 1/2 c. (6 oz) shredded cheddar cheese
1 c. crushed saltines (about 30 crackers) I used Ritz crackers.
1 c. finely shredded carrots (um, I skipped the carrots, didn’t feel like shredding them)
1/2 c. finely chopped onion
1/2 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. garlic powder
1/4 tsp. pepper
2 lbs lean ground beef
1/2 c. packed brown sugar
1/2 c. ketchup
2 Tbsp. Dijon mustard

In a large bowl, combine the eggs, milk, cheese, saltines, carrots, onion, salt, garlic powder, and pepper.
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Crumble beef over mixture and mix well.

Yeah, I know, doesn’t look too appetizing at this point, huh?
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Shape into a loaf. Place in a greased 9×13 baking dish. I made a half recipe and just put it in a loaf pan.

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Bake, uncovered, at 350 for 50 minutes. 
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For glaze, bring the brown sugar, ketchup, and mustard to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, for 3-5 min or until heated through. Spoon over meat loaf.

Bake 10-15 min longer or until meat is no longer pink and a meat thermometer reads 160. Drain; let set for 10 min before slicing. Yield: 12 servings.
mp meat6   Ok, I FINALLY found my meat loaf recipe! Over the last several years, I’ve tried recipes hit-n-miss and they all tasted sorta blah. (Same with poor man’s steak.) This one is SO good! It is so moist and flavorful. Sometime, I might even try it with the carrots.  

mp salad   And a picture of the salad … because I always think salads are so pretty. I have a few menus that I make for company and will add this meal now.  

Wet Burritos

This recipe came from my mother-in-law. It’s really good!!!!! Try it!

Wet Burritos

1 lb hamburger
1 sm onion
1 pk taco seasoning
1 can refried beans
8 soft tortillas (9 inch)
1 can cream of mushroom soup
2 cups sour cream
8 oz grated cheese

Fry hamburger with onion. Add seasoning and beans. Put 1/8 of meat mixture in each tortilla. Roll up. Mix mushroom soup and sour cream. Put 1/2 of it into greased 9×13 pan. Put rolled tortillas in next,
burritos1
burritos2  then put rest of sauce on top, then the cheese. 
burritos3   Bake at 350 for 40 min.
burritos4  Serve with sour cream and salsa. It’s so easy to make! With good babies and all, you can go from nothing to eating within an hour! In the 40 minutes it’s baking, you can easily get the rest of the meal around.

We had crescent rolls and salad with it.
burritos salad   I make my own croutons instead of buy them because I don’t like the hard ones that you can’t stab with a fork. It’s so easy… just take a couple pieces of bread, cut them into chunks with a pizza cutter. Put some melted butter in a pan (however much you want, I usually do around a Tablespoon, maybe a little less), then dash a few spices in, like oregano, basil, and onion power, or garlic powder. Throw the bread cubes in and mix them around till they seem to be pretty much coated with the butter. Put the pan in the oven for about 10 minutes, more if you want. Sometime during that time, I take the pan out and shake it around a little to try to get some of the croutons to flip over. They have a crunch, but yet you can stab them with a fork. Perfect!!!

Stromboli

In researching how to make stromboli about 6 years ago, I found there are alot of different variations out there (different kinds, different shapes, braided tops, spiral-rolled, etc. So, I experimented with it and here is the result… a recipe of my stromboli, tried and true, we love it! I’ve only ever made 2 different kinds… pizza and steak. Tonight was steak.

Steak and Cheese Stromboli

1 loaf frozen bread dough, thawed
14 oz pkg thinly sliced beef Philly steak
Montreal steak seasoning  *edit* or seasoning of your choice
1 tsp. oil
1 green pepper
1/2 of an onion
Handful or 2 of sliced mushrooms
3/4 cup pizza sauce
2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
Butter
Parmesan cheese

Put the oil in an electric skillet and turn to 300. Cut up green pepper and onion into approx. 1 1/2″ x 1/4″ pieces and fry for a few minutes, stirring often`. Add steak and sprinkle steak seasoning on it
strom1  and fry a few more minutes until no longer pink. Throw the mushrooms in and stir it.
strom2 Put it on simmer while you roll out the bread dough into a rectangle about 12″ x 8″ x 1/2″. (This measurement is a wild guess, by the way. ) Spread pizza sauce on it.
strom3 Then spoon meat mixture on it, then put cheese on top.
strom4 Now, the dreaded part… getting it closed.   Pull the edges up around to the middle (the edges are usually fatter, so it’s got some extra to give) and pinch to seal. Then seal the ends too. If any holes break open, patch them up, or the problem will magnify as it bakes! I always have one hole somewhere somehow.  
strom5 Then flip it over onto the pan… a quick smooth maneuver would be good here.   Butter the top with very soft butter or melted butter and sprinkle with Parmesan cheese.
strom6  Bake at 350 for 25-30 minutes.
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YUM!
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To make the pizza variation , trade the steak, seasoning, oil, grn pepper, and onion for an 8 oz pkg of pepperoni. Then if your taste buds allow, sprinkle some crushed red pepper on the cheese before closing it up. It gives it extra zip.  Do everything else the same. No frying involved though… that’s handier.

What style and flavor of stromboli do you make?

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