I’ve got two easy recipes for you today. These are perfect for those days that you have limited amount of time to pull dinner off but still want something yummy that the whole family will eat.
Have you heard of the TV show Chopped? I must admit, I love cooking and home tv shows. I miss that we don’t have cable anymore because I’m pretty sure I overdid on how much I watched. I’m pretty sure my husband is glad we no longer have cable because he got a little sick (understatement of the year) of my fascination with these types of shows.
Recently Netflix has added a whole bunch of cooking and home tv shows. Chopped is one of them. Yay! It is fun to watch what everyone will do with what is in the basket. So, when Sargento® reached out to me to sponsor this post and ask if I would participate in a Chopped at Home challenge…I jumped at the chance. Hello… me be part of a Chopped at Home challenge. Yep, sign me up.
Then they gave me my four ingredients. Chicken tenders. Good. Salsa. Yum. Sargento Cheese…hello we are total cheese addicts. Yum. Couscous…Uh-oh. I’ve never worked with couscous or even eaten couscous. I guess I was a chicken to try something new and it seemed like all of the TV shows I had seen it on, it was all fancied up and big time chefs were doing all this stuff with it. I was a little intimidated.
I accepted the challenge anyway and thought it would be fun to come up with something and hope I could do it justice.
I started with something I knew everyone would love. (Both of these easy recipes are in a file you can download at the bottom of this post.) Baked chicken tenders with a crispy cheesy crust. Yum!
I started by mixing together light sour cream and salsa and put that on top of the chicken tenders. Then I mixed up some fresh bread crumbs with the Sargento Off the Block 4 Cheese Mexican shredded cheese and a few other things and put that on top. The chicken was popped it in the oven and baked until it was cooked and the bread/cheese mixture was brown and crisp.
While the chicken was baking, I entered into the world of couscous. I have learned, in the little research I did, that it is one of the fastest and easiest things to cook. Perfect for a busy week night dinner.
Bring the chicken stock and butter to a boil, add the couscous and salt. Mix. Put the lid on and remove from the heat. Wait 5 – 10 minutes and it is done. Geez…that was easy, why was I intimidated again?
To add more flavor and ensure my kids would eat this new food, I added salsa (very similar to the crazy easy Spanish rice I make) and the Sargento Off the Block 4 Cheese Mexican shredded cheese to the couscous as well. Like I said, we are cheese addicts. Adding cheese to something pretty much guarantees it will be eaten. 🙂
I’m telling you this was a crazy easy meal to make. I think had I been on the show Chopped, I would have actually made the time limit. Woohoo!
Then it was time to serve dinner. I had two judges who commented on my Chopped at home dinner.
Judge Pumpkin, my youngest daughter, said the Chicken was perfect. She said the couscous needed more salsa and salt and that it was a little gummy. It could be more fluffy. I totally agreed with her. I will have to tweak the couscous a little bit next time I make some.
Judge Snowflake, my oldest daughter, said there was one problem with the couscous…she needed more on her plate. She also said the chicken was amazing.
Download your easy recipes for Cheesy Bake Chicken and Couscous here.
So I’m pretty sure I won at the Chopped at home challenge, at least at my home. You can really win! Sargento is sponsoring a Chopped at Home contest where you can win $10,000! You totally need to enter and have a fun evening with your family eating a yummy cheesy dinner of your own creation. Who knows, you could be the winner!
What recipe, featuring Sargento Cheese, would you submit to the Chopped at Home Contest?
More Yumminess for You:
Available in 30 versatile varieties, unique blends and distinct cuts, Sargento Shredded Cheese is always cut from blocks of 100% real, natural cheese. For more inspiration, check out the Sargento Pinterest page Pinterest.com/sargentocheese/ or visit Sargento.com for more information. The Chopped at Home Challenge gives viewers a chance to create their best recipe using the selected basket ingredients, including Sargento Shredded Cheese, for a chance to win $10,000!
This is a sponsored conversation written by me on behalf of Sargento. The opinions and text are all mine.
