So, I’m currently typing this with gloves on….no joke.  They are purple and pink, and have princess crowns on them.  Pretty sure my parents gave them to me as a gag gift stocking stuffer a couple of years ago.  My hands are SO FREAKING cold!!!  Actually, all of me is cold, and I can’t seem to get warm.  Tonight is definitely going to be a night where I sleep in long pants and long sleeves……which is EXTREMELY rare for me and probably means I’m dying.  And as far as the gloves go, well, they were closest thing at hand (no pun intended).  They were already out, since little brother wore them to shovel the driveway  when it snowed last.  He’s secure in himself and will rock some sweet princess gloves whenever he feels like it.

Speaking of little brother, he made the comment that I need to work on my food photos.  Duh.  I know this.  I never claimed to be a food photographer.  In fact, much of what you see on this page is pics that I snap of my food immediately prior to me stuffing my face with it!  Which also accounts for some ridiculously sized portions….don’t judge.  Sometimes, a girl just needs to smash.  Got it?  But nevertheless, my most sincere apologize for my crappy food pics.  I’ll work on it….eventually.  Promise!

The recipes I’m posting tonight are kind of a “choose your own adventure” dinner.  I started off by being super lazy and making the chicken in the crockpot, with the intention of making tacos.  Then I got home Monday night, said screw it, and cooked up some cauliflower rice….and BOOM!  The burrito bowl was born.  Skip to tonight were I was feeling lazy again….so I stuffed the leftovers into peppers and just popped them in the oven.  Easy eats are the tastiest kind!!  So here they are.  Eat them all together, make them separately, do whatever your heart desires! Just get down with your paleo self.

Crockpot Spicy Pulled Chicken

• 2 pounds frozen chicken (I used all breast meat, but you could use thighs as well, or a combo)
• 2 cups prepared salsa (use a brand without a bunch of extra crap in it, or make your own….choose your heat level to suit your tastes)
• 2 small cans diced green chiles (do not drain these!)
• 1 jalapeno, seeds and ribs removed, diced
• 1 tablespoon chili powder
• 1 teaspoon cumin
• 1 teaspoon dried cilantro
• 1 teaspoon onion powder
• 1 teaspoon garlic powder

1. Place frozen chicken in crockpot.
2. Cover chicken with all remaining ingredients.
3. Set your crockpot to LOW and cook for 8 hours. Mine went for 8 hours, then I had little brother turn it to WARM when he got home….and it was on that setting for another 2 hours.
4. Shred chicken with a fork!

Cilantro Lime Cauliflower Rice

• 2 smallish heads of cauliflower
• 1 small yellow onion, diced
• 4 cloves garlic, minced
• 1 bunch fresh cilantro
• 2 limes
• Salt to taste

1. Using the chopping blade on a food processor (or you could grate it by hand, but that would SUCK hardcore) in small batches, add your cauliflower and pulse it until it looks like grains of rice.  I had to do this in about 4 batches.  No worries. I just dumped it all into a big bowl until I had pulverized all of it!
2. In a deep skillet, heat 2 tablespoons of coconut oil over medium high heat.
3. Saute onions and garlic until they begin to get a bit of color and start to soften….about 5 minutes.
4. Add in your “rice” and stir it around in the onions, garlic, and oil.  It’s cool if your pan seems over-loaded, it actually helps to create some steam.  Continue to stir it every couple of minutes until the rice begins to soften up a bit and gets to a texture that you like for cooked rice.  Mine went for about 7 minutes or so.
5. Squeeze the juice of your limes over your rice and toss in the chopped cilantro.  Continue to cook with these ingredients for another 5 minutes.
6. EAT!

To make the burrito bowl:

1. Serve up some rice in a bowl.
2. Top it with some of your chicken.
3. For toppings, I added some more salsa, some chopped lettuce, some Sriracha, some cilantro, and some avocado…DUH.
4. Mix it all up until it’s just a mess of delicious food and SMASH!  Relish in how awesome your cooking abilities are, and how that “chain restaurant” that offers a similar burrito bowl, ain’t got NOTHING on you!

To make the stuffed peppers:

1. Preheat your oven to 375 degrees.
2. Cut the tops off of 4 green peppers, and pull out all seeds and ribs, but leaving the pepper in tact as a cup.
3. Stuff each pepper about half way full of your leftover rice.
4. Top each pepper with your leftover pulled chicken.
5. Arrange in a glass baking dish.
6. Put about 1/2 inch of water in the bottom of your dish to create some steam while cooking.
7. Bake for 30-35 minutes (or until peppers are cooked to desired done-ness….I like mine on the crunchier side, so I actually pull mine out at about 25 minutes)
8. Top with whatever toppings you choose!  I used the same ones I topped my burrito bowls with.

Hopefully this gives some options to play around with!  It was all STUPIDLY easy, and aided in my general laziness.  Tomorrow I’m going to get all sorts of crazy and wrap some brussels sprouts in bacon….so you just wait!  Sending warm, princess glove, chamomile tea drinking love your way!

-Meister