My Favorite Things

(Kathleen's older daughter, Elissa, here)

I love The Sound of Music and enjoyed watching the remake last night.  As a musician, I am friends with a lot of people who had critical reviews of it.  I enjoyed it, I though it was entertaining and refreshing that NBC dedicated an entire prime time to a special without profanity, sex or violence that isn't an athletic event!  Without completely meaning to, I ended up cooking a dinner that is inspired by The Sound of Music, hence the title "My Favorite Things."

I really love Mexican food, so taco night is a common occurrence in the V casa. I also really love to repurpose leftovers.  It is a great source of pride to me how little food my family wastes.  And today was a snow day-who doesn't love those?!?!  And nothing says "snow day" like taco night... Right?

Tonight's taco night was a classic leftover creation.  I used homemade tortillas and hot sauce leftover from our Thanksgiving trip to my husband's hometown of Lamesa, TX.  I had a sweet and spicy pork roast left over from earlier this week (that recipe is in an earlier blog post).  I broiled the veggie portion of the "fajitas two ways" recipe (also featured in an earlier post).  I decided to do that because I had a baggie of sliced bell peppers that I would have packed for lunch... But it was a snow day, and I don't want to waste that either, so I sliced an onion and voila!  I had a delicious side dish.  

I even grated some Monterey jack sandwich cheese that I let sit too close to a warm dish and it melted too much to put on sandwiches.  Yep, I could've tossed it, but by now I'm sure you're starting to understand the extent to which I hate to throw away food.  Plus, it was a slightly creamier cheese thn what I normally serve, so it was a nice treat for my kids.

Add some guacamole (a staple in our house) and you're good to go!

The only part of my meal I actually made new tonight was the seasoned black beans-So at my Mom's encouragement I'm sharing that simple recipe tonight.

I've got a recipe for nearly every variety of beans you could want... but until recently my husband swore that he did not like black beans.  Then I came across this recipe for seasoning black beans.  It is actually a small component of another recipe I found on Pinterest, but the beans are hands down the best part of that recipe.

Seasoned Black Beans

Ingredients

2 cans black beans

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

2 cloves minced garlic

1 seeded and minced jalapeño (I use Trappy's jarred jalapeños)

1/2 teaspoon cumin

Instructions

Sauté vegetable oil, garlic and jalapeño in a medium pot for one minute. Add cumin and sauté one minute more.

Add the black beans, stir and heat through.  Depending on the texture you like, you can cook it with the juices from the can, or rinse and drain the beans.

It's that easy!!!  Seriously, they are so good.  Take my freshly seasoned beans, plus my repurposed leftovers, and you're all set.  The only thing missing is a delicious local brew and a family to eat with :-).

Look at all those delicious leftovers...