Chicken Azteca Recipe

I love getting tried and true recipes from my friends!  A few years ago, a friend gave me this recipe for Chicken Azteca.  I tried it and loved it, my non-bean eating family did not, but they were willing to keep it on the menu if I didn't make it often.  We were feeding the missionaries from our church the other day for dinner and I decided to pull the Chicken Azteca recipe out and make it using THRIVE FD Sweet Corn and THRIVE Instant Black Beans.  It turned out great!

Because I was running out the door, I didn't have time to reconstitute the corn and black beans and threw them into the crockpot dry and added in 3 cups of water.  When it came time to serve dinner, I drained some of the liquid out of the mixture and wish I hadn't.  So that will be different the next time I make this recipe.  I also had some extra chicken breast that I added and had to pull out before shredding it as it was too much chicken, although no one else thought there was too much chicken.  My husband did say there were too many beans.  But since he didn't pick any out of his dinner, that means there really weren't.  Adjust your quantities of Beans to match your family's preference.

Chicken Azteca

2 cups THRIVE FD Sweet Corn

1 1/2 cup THRIVE Instant Black Beans

3 cups water

1 cup salsa

1 clove garlic or 1/8 tsp garlic granules/powder

1/2 tsp ground cumin

4 boneless skinless chicken breast or 2 cups THRIVE FD Chopped Chicken, reconstituted

1 pkg cream cheese, cubed

Hot Cooked Rice

Shredded Cheddar or THRIVE FD Cheddar Cheese, reconstituted

Combine corn, beans, 1/2 cup salsa, garlic, cumin, and 3 cups water in slow cooker.  Arrange chicken over top; pour remaining salsa over chicken.  Cover; cook on High 2-3 hours or on low 4-6 hours.

If using fresh chicken breast, remove chicken and cut into bite-size pieces; return chicken to slow cooker.

Add cream cheese and stir.  Cook on High until cream cheese melts and blends into sauce.

Serve over rice.  Top with cheddar cheese.

Day 2

This recipe made a lot!  So even though the missionaries were eating with us, I still had a ton of leftovers.  I mentioned it at the end of our meal on Day 1 that I thought it would be good wrapped in a tortilla. Everyone seemed to agree so the next day, that's what I had for lunch.  To make it more like a burrito, I chopped up a fresh tomato and added some sour cream.  It was delicious (and I ate it again the next day).  I think it would be even better with some fresh pico de gallo.  And if you notice the white cream on my tortilla, that's sour cream.  That is my trick for keeping burritos and tacos together - take a small dab of sour cream and put it where the tortilla overlaps.  Super easy and makes setting your food down to help a child without having your dinner fall apart so much easier!

Anniversary Chicken in the Crockpot

One of the recipes I chose for this week's Menu Plan is Anniversary Chicken.  A friend introduced this recipe to me a few years ago (she actually shares lots of great recipes so I love going to her house for dinner).  With this hot weather, I decided to make it in the crockpot (not for the first time) to prevent the oven from heating up the house.  I actually use my crockpot more in the summer than in the winter for that reason.  One reader commented that she'd like to see how I did this in the crockpot so I'm sharing - even though THRIVE was not a part of it.  Hope you enjoy!

 Because I was short on time, I skipped browning the chicken in oil on the stovetop that the original recipe calls for and just placed the raw chicken breast in the crockpot.  I drizzled it with Teriyaki sauce.

Have you discovered the Hickory Bacon Ranch Dressing from Hidden Valley?  This recipe was good with regular Ranch but the Hickory Bacon Ranch kicks it up a few notches!  I squirted some on top of the chicken.

 Then sprinkled with cheddar cheese (and this would be one area where I could use THRIVE - THRIVE FD Cheddar Cheese) and bacon bits.

I set the crockpot to High and let the chicken cook for 3-4 hours.  I was sick that night so my husband took over for the sides.

Here's the recipe for those who don't want to click through....

Anniversary Chicken 

2 T vegetable oil
6 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
1/2 cup teriyaki basting sauce
1/2 cup Ranch dressing
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
3 green onions, chopped
1/2 (3 ounce) can bacon bits
1 T chopped fresh parsley for garnish

Preheat oven to 350 degrees
In a large skilled, heat oil over medium-high heat.  Add chicken breasts, and saute 4 to 5 minutes each side, until lightly browned.
Place browned chicken breasts in a 9x13 baking dish.  Brush with teriyaki sauce, then spoon on Ranch.  Sprinkle with cheese, green onions and bacon bits.
Bake for 25 to 35 minutes or until chicken is no longer pink and juices run clear.  Garnish with parsley and serve.

Source:  "Anniversary Chicken I" recipe by VICKI117 on

For cooking in the crockpot, place chicken in crockpot, add toppings and cook on High 3-4 hours.  Simple, but delicious!  Perfect for a hot summer day, and year-round!

Recipe Guinea Pigs and Slow Cooker Vegetable Beef Roast recipe

Printable Recipe


Are you a Recipe Guinea Pig?  If you eat dinner at my house, you may become one!

My husband always harasses me because I like to try out new recipes when we have guests over and it usually ends up being the missionaries from our Church (who we feed about once a month).   Why do I need to use our guests as my recipe Guinea Pigs?   There are 2 reasons I try new recipes out on guests, one related to determining if it's us or the recipe, and one in case it's truly a bomb (I'll post about a recent bomb soon).

Reason 1:  I have picky eaters so sometimes I don't know if the reason my family doesn't like a recipe is because it's a bad recipe or because it's just not for our family.  By trying out new recipes on guests, I can get an opinion from outside my picky family.  My kids may be saying Yuck but they say that a lot.  So I use the guests for a non-biased (hopefully) opinion.

Reason 2:  I have a family of 4 with 2 of those being young picky girls.  If the recipe is horrible, whether it's due to my cooking skills or to the recipe itself, what do I do with the leftovers?  I've tried recipes that made a 9x13 pan full and we've eaten maybe 1/3 of it and decided we didn't like it.  As much as I am the one who normally eats the small quantities of leftovers, if it's a bomb, I just can't eat 2/3 of a pan of something that didn't work for us.  Enter guests :)  And instead of dividing the recipe by 4 (sort of), it's divided up further.  He he.  And just for the record, my last bomb involving guests, I ran around the corner right after dinner and bought ice cream for everyone after I threw away the leftovers.

So tonight was an even bigger experiment.  I had a roast planned for tonight's dinner.  But when I pulled out my recipe, at the deadline for getting the roast into the crock pot in time, I discovered that I was missing half the ingredients for seasoning the roast.  Then I remembered that I had recently downloaded this new cookbook from Country Cooking to my Kindle Fire, surely it has a beef roast recipe.  I quickly found one titled "Vegetable Pot Roast" and it called for lots of fresh vegetables which I didn't have - BUT I did have them in THRIVE, and other products!  So instead of just trying out a new recipe I had found - it was a recipe that I modified on the fly.

Here's the cast of characters...

 You may notice that not all of these are THRIVE products.  I started purchasing THRIVE in November 2011 and have built up quite a collection - but I haven't gotten everything.  Plus being a good steward, I need to use up what I already had.  And since I used up the Mushrooms and my Onions are getting low (plus the onions are dehydrated rather than freeze dried), my next THRIVE order is going to include these items.

Step 1 - I tossed my roast into the crock pot and sprinkled with salt and pepper.  Then I covered it with the mushrooms, onions, THRIVE FD Celery and carrots.

 I then added THRIVE Tomato Powder and remaining spices.

Pour the water over the top of everything and give it a stir.

Because I was running out of time, I cooked the roast on High for 4-5 hrs and pulled it out as the missionaries arrived for dinner.  Sadly, I forgot to take a picture of the roast until after we started putting it on plates.

Here's my plate, served with my favorite coleslaw and Roasted Green Beans (made from reconstituted THRIVE Green Beans).

The verdict from my Recipe Guinea Pigs?  Yum!  Even my "I don't like meat" 5 y/o asked for seconds of the roast!  My  "I don't like vegetables" 9 y/o asked what was in it and when I said there were lots of vegetables with the roast, she said "I couldn't tell there were vegetables with it."  My husband also gave it rave reviews.  The missionaries cleaned their plates but didn't ask for seconds so I'm going to count them as neutral.

Notes for next time - With a little more time I would probably brown the roast before putting it in the crockpot - just for the fun of it.  And I might mix all the dry ingredients together in a bowl before adding them to the crock pot rather than the layers.  I also will put more of the vegetables on the platter with the meat and maybe sneak them onto some unsuspecting daughter's plate.


So here's the recipe, with links to the ingredients as THRIVE products.

Slow Cooker Vegetable Beef Roast

Printable Recipe

• 1 Small (about 2 To 4 Lb. Size) Beef Roast
• Salt And Pepper
• 1 cup THRIVE FD Mushrooms
• 1 cup THRIVE FD Onion
• 1 Tablespoon THRIVE FD Celery
• 2 Tablespoons THRIVE Carrots
• ¾ teaspoons Dried Minced Garlic
• 1 teaspoon Thyme
• 1 teaspoon Chili Powder
• 2  Bay Leaves
• ¼ cup THRIVE Tomato Powder
• 2 teaspoons THRIVE Beef Bouillon   OR 2 Beef Bouillon cubes
• 2-½ cups Water

Sprinkle the roast with the salt and pepper on both sides.
Place roast in crock pot. Spread mushrooms, onions, celery and carrots over the roast. Sprinkle garlic, thyme, chili powder and bay leaves on top. Add tomato powder and bouillon cubes, then pour water over top. You may wish to stir everything up before putting lid on the crockpot.
Cover crockpot and cook on low for 7 hours or on high for 4-5 hours.