Mexican Chicken Soup

Subtitle: Live and Learn
Let me start by saying that Alex is not the biggest fan of soup.  I could eat it pretty much everyday from October 1st to March 31st.  So making soup is a little bit of a gamble in the "Will Alex really eat this?" game.  I'll take my chances.  Ok, that's out of my system.  Now on to the cooking mishaps (which I seem to be racking up lately).

Ready to go!  Turn on low and walk away!

I am always shocked by the small amount of liquid crock pots require... almost like whatever you put in makes it's own liquid as it cooks.  Well, not this time!  I got this recipe from Pinterest, and followed it basically to a T, except that I did not use undrained canned corn, I used frozen (no big deal, right? Wrong!)  So I came home to a glob of nicely browned cream cheese atop a mound of dry roasted spices.  Nice.  But I was not about to throw out all that food and try to come up with something else for dinner (pizza, anybody?).  I crushed a couple bullion cubes and added 2 cups of water, stirred it around, and it came together pretty nicely.  It's a little salty for me, probably because of the bullion cubes, but serving over white rice helps mellow the salty flavor.  Next time I'll know better.  Other than that - it was good!  I am picking around the chicken pieces (faux vegetarian that I am), but I was able to break up the chicken with a wooden spoon, so I would say that's about as tender as it gets.  {I love my crock pot}.  The recipe says canned black beans, but I ended up cooking my own from dried beans (another recipe in itself).  I've avoided it in the past because I have had so many disappointments cooking with dried pinto beans, but I thought I would give it another try.  These turned out good, but they took forever to cook.  An all day event.  I forgot I had them on the stove probably 3 or 4 times.  They also require pre-soaking over night.  All that being said, it gives me a little more piece of mind, knowing that cooking from dried beans is more environmentally friendly (hippy Suzie), healthier because of some of the yucky stuff that can be found on the inside of the cans used to can beans and other veggies (dietitian Suzie), plus it's even cheaper than canned beans (frugal Suzie).  Yes I still used canned tomatoes and chilies.  I'm trying, ok?  Enough talk!  Get to the kitchen!

Someone has been smelling dinner cooking all day.

Mexican Chicken Soup

2 chicken breasts (frozen or fresh)

1 can black beans

1 can Rotel 

~1 cup frozen corn 

1 packet Ranch seasoning

1 tsp onion powder 

1 tsp chili powder 

1 tsp cumin 

8 oz cream cheese 

~ 2 cups of water
*Add a bullion cube if you aren't as taste sensitive to salt, will give some extra flavor. 

Finished product, yum!

You know the drill - throw it all in the crock pot, cook on Low for 6-8 hours, stir before serving, serve over rice (or as a dip).