Chicken or Beef fajitas

In the very early years of our marriage, Dave and I visited his parents for the weekend and were served fajitas. His mom had bought a chicken fajita mix from the butcher that was just incredibly delicious. That launched me on what was probably the very first recipe sleuthing enterprise. I worked for years to recreate the flavors of those original fajitas.

Of course, over time, this recipe has also evolved. Occasionally I’ll forget that I know how to make fajitas for months at a time, but sooner or later, I realize that we’re LONG overdue for this favorite meal.

Chicken or Beef Fajitas

There are two main variations of this recipe that I make–the regular recipe and the oh-shoot-I-forgot-to-plan-anything-for-dinner variation.

For the regular recipe, I marinate the following for a couple of hours:

• 2 medium-sized red onions, sliced
• 3 bell peppers (preferably, 1 green, 1 red, and 1 yellow….but I use whatever I can get for a reasonable price)
• 2/3 c. lime juice
• 1/4 c. olive oil
• 1 t. salt
• 1 t. Italian seasoning
• 1 t. paprika
• 1 t. chili powder
• 2 pounds of chicken or flank steak, cut into long strips
• 1/2 bunch of ciantro, washed and coarsely chopped

I pour about 2 T. olive oil into a large skillet and heat the skillet. When it’s very hot, I dump the chicken, onions, marinade, and peppers. I stir and saute until the chicken is done.

I serve this mixture on warm flour tortillas with sour cream, slices of avocado, more cilantro, and salsa. DELISH!

If I’m having One of Those Days (kinda like today!) and hit 5:45 and still haven’t even thought about dinner, this is how I handle fajitas.

FAST Fajitas

In a large skillet, I saute:

• 2 T. olive oil
• 2 red onions, sliced (although I must admit that today, it was just a plain yellow onion!)
• 2 large peppers (one pasilla and one hungarian hot pepper), coarsely chopped

Once those items are partway cooked, I added some hastily chopped chicken and continued to cook on a very hot burner. Once the chicken was nearly done, I stirred in a half a bunch of chopped cilantro. After the chicken was completely cooked, I removed the pan from the burner and stirred in about 1/2 c. lime juice and some chili powder and salt.

This mixture, which only took about 18 minutes to cook, I served on microwaved warm flour tortillas with chopped fresh tomatoes. It wasn’t exactly the same as the marinated fajitas, but it tasted great and was pretty healthy for “fast food”!

Barb