New Recipe Challenge

A challenge has been suggested by Judy over at Scrapshare to try a new recipe each week. You can see the initial thread here and this week's challenge thread here. I encourage everyone to come join in with us. Many of us are recipe collectors. We see something in a magazine and clip it out intending to give it a try. We do this time and time again with the best of intentions but just never get around to trying all those wonderful recipes. Add to that all the wonderful recipes one can find on the internet and you can have quite the backlog of recipes cluttering up your life. This challenge encourages us to get out all those random recipes and start giving them a try in the hopes of cutting the clutter and finding some new staple recipes to add to our meal line-ups.

I took up the challenge because I have many, many recipes I keep intending to try. The idea is to commit to one night a week, each week to try a new recipe. I have tentatively picked Wednesday nights because there is rarely anything going on that takes us out of the house on that night. This challenge was suggested today and as it happened I was already planning to try a new recipe tonight so I went ahead and gave it a shot.

I have had a version of Indian Tacos that was commercially produced and I love them. I found a recipe for the fry bread recently along with a recipe for the tacos themselves at this website. It sounded really good and pretty easy so I gave it a shot. These turned out great and were super easy to make though I did modify the topping recipe a bit. I added a can of chili and a bit of taco seasoning to the meat to give it a bit more ommpff. The whole family enjoyed it. This one is a keeper.

I encourage you to give it a try.

Indian Taco Recipe - How To Make Indian Tacos

1 pound lean ground meat (beef, lamb, venison or pork)
1 cup diced onion
4 cooked Navajo Fry Breads (see recipe on right)
1 head iceberg lettuce, shredded
3 tomatoes, diced
2 cups shredded sharp Cheddar cheese
1 (3-ounce) can diced green chiles, drained
Sour cream (optional)

In a large frying pan over medium-high heat, brown ground meat and onions until cooked; remove from heat.

Place Fry Bread, cupped side up, on separate plates. Layer ground meat, lettuce, tomatoes,
Cheddar cheese, and green chiles onto top of each Fry Bread.
Top with sour cream, if desired, and either roll up or serve open-faced with a fork.

Makes 4 servings.


_________________________________________

Navajo Fry Bread Recipe - How To Make Navajo Fry Bread
by Cynthia Detterick-Pineda

Fry bread is wonderfully lumpy (puffed here and there). It can be served as a dessert or used as a main dish bread. Our family will often take them and stuff them, much like one might use bread or tortilla to dip into their food.

1 cup unbleached flour
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon powdered milk
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 cup water
Vegetable oil for frying

Sift together the flour, salt, powdered milk, and baking powder into a large bowl. Pour the water over the flour mixture all at once and stir the dough with a fork until it starts to form one big clump.

Flour your hands. Using your hands, begin to mix the dough, trying to get all the flour into the mixture to form a ball. NOTE: You want to mix this well, but you do NOT want to knead it. Kneading it will make for a heavy Fry Bread when cooked. The inside of the dough ball should still be sticky after it is formed, while the outside will be well floured.

Cut the dough into four (4) pieces. Using your floured hands, shape, stretch, pat, and form a disk of about 5 to 7 inches in diameter. NOTE: Don’t worry about it being round. As Grandma Felipa would say “it doesn’t roll into your mouth.”

Heat the vegetable oil to about 350 degrees F. NOTE: You can check by either dropping a small piece of dough in the hot oil and seeing if it begins to fry, or by dipping the end of a wooden spoon in and seeing if that bubbles. Your oil should be about 1-inch deep in a large cast-iron skillet or other large fryer.

Take the formed dough and gently place it into the oil, being careful not to splatter the hot oil. Press down on the dough as it fries so the top is submersed into the hot oil. Fry until brown, and then flip to fry the other side. Each side will take about 3 to 4 minutes.

Indian Fry Bread can be kept warm in a 200 degree F. oven for up to 1 hour. They refrigerate well and can be reheated in a 350 degree F. oven for 10 to 15 minutes before serving.