Old El Paso products are a staple in our house. It’s one of the few “box meals” that I will regularly buy. The truth is I’ve tried making Mexican from scratch and the results have been less than stellar. Relying on Old el Paso is not only simpler, but I also end up with a much tastier end result. I am, in short, a pretty big fan of their taco kits and their canned beans. So when I saw they had come out with a new restaurant inspired line of taco kits I was pretty eager to test them out.
I also love Old El Paso because their kits are so very simple to make. This means they are perfect for times when the kids want to help cook, or for nights when it’s hubby’s turn to make dinner, and for nights like this one when we are on a tight schedule.
See, in what was quite probably not one of my shining moments of brilliance, we decided to wait until the day before Halloween to get pumpkins. So when my husband got home Thursday night we all piled into the van to head out to the local grocery store to buy our two pumpkins. This turned into the Great Pumpkin Hunt of 2014, which ended with us buying one truly massive pumpkin, the last pumpkin left at some roadside vegetable stand, after having tried half a dozen grocers. Note to self: next year we get the pumpkins earlier! Our run-all-over-the-city checking grocery stores pumpkin hunt ate up a huge chunk of time. We still needed to head home and clean out and carve the darn thing, and I still needed to make dinner.
The original plan had called for hubby making dinner. When he had noticed the Old El Paso Resturante kits sitting in the kitchen he had volunteered, something I was certainly not going to say no to! But then he came home from work with a nasty headache, and we went pumpkin hunting with two excited and noisy kids, and by the time we got back home he was pretty desperate to just go lie down somewhere dark and quiet. So I stepped up to bat and whipped up some very yummy Chicken Tinga tacos.
Three chicken breasts, an onion and the kit, that’s all we needed. Though I added a chopped avocado to the table because it’s my kids favourite topping. As I was preparing the food I worried that maybe the Chicken Tinga tacos on their own wouldn’t be enough. I often make refried beans or mexican rice to go with tacos, but tonight I had skipped it and at this point I didn’t have the time, or the ingredients, to start making a side dish. However my worries were unfounded, the Chicken Tings kit all on it’s lonesome made plenty of food. I even had a small bit of chicken leftovers to put away for the next day. The only thing I would change is that next time I would buy an extra package of tortillas. My family prefers to eat several smaller easier to bite tacos vs a few massive ones. But really, this kit was enough food, more then enough food, all on it’s own.
And it was good. Really, really, good. This wasn’t just chicken soft tacos with a new name, it had a unique and fantastic taste with just a bit of a bite to it. Everyone in my family loved it. The kids skipped the spicy chipotle sauce which it came packaged with, while hubby and I piled it on. It was a fantastically yummy meal that everyone enjoyed.
It was super simple and quick to make. It was a bit different from other chicken taco kits in that the directions told you to cook the chicken breasts whole, pull the cooked chicken apart with two forks, and then toss the shredded chicken back in the pan to soak up the sauce. The end result was delicious.
Now granted, as I said above we normally enjoy Old El Paso meals. This blows their regular kits out of the water. It was like ten times better. Ten times better than something we already liked. Needless to say I will definitely be making this again soon.
And I can’t wait to try out the other two Old El Paso Restaurante flavours, Steak Carne Asada and Baja Fish Tacos. Yum. I’m particularly excited about the Baja Fish Tacos kit, as fish tacos is a dish I will often order at a Mexican restaurant. I am eagerly anticipating making this at home, some night when my fish hating husband is not around.
How about you folks? Have you tried the new Restaurante kits yet?
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