Jalapeno Ranch Salad Dressing

One of our favorite meals around here is taco salad - we love it!  I think what we love most about it is the jalapeno ranch salad dressing we put on top of it.  This dressing is so good and you can put it on anything - salad and fish tacos go from pretty good to really delicious with this dressing.  You can use it for up to 4 weeks and it comes together in about 3 minutes.

I forgot to take a picture of everything in the blender, so this is the best I could do.

Ingredients:
2 cups ranch salad dressing (bottle/homemade)
2 jalapeno peppers, stemmed and seeded - cut in half
1/4 cup cilantro leaves
2 tbsp lime juice

Directions:
Place all ingredients in either a blender or food processor.  Blend until smooth.

Yummy taco salad before the dressing - excuse our Christmas bowls.  We have finally put them away, ha!

Mmm, this makes me hungry!

I don't really follow this recipe exactly - you can keep adding/blending until it's just right for your tastes.  Example - I normally keep the seeds in one of the jalapenos because we like a little spice.  Last week when I made this instead of my normal Hidden Valley Ranch in a bottle I made the 'homemade' ranch dressing using the Hidden Valley packet of mix/milk/mayo  - that stuff is yummy!!!

Easy Chicken Noodle Soup

I needed a recipe to use up some boiled chicken breast I had in the fridge and I found this one on All Recipes.  It was true to it's name, easy!  We really liked it and are still eating the leftovers.  It is the perfect soup for a cold night and it reheats well for leftovers - I added a little more vegetable stock to the leftovers b/c there wasn't a ton of broth left in the tupperware.  I added too much "filling" - chicken, noodles, veggies - but I always end up doing that for some reason.  It was still good and I like my soup extra noodle-y anyway.  :)  I know it's after Christmas but I made this a few weeks ago and to be honest, we still have not put up our Christmas dishes or mugs yet!

Ingredients
1 tablespoon butter
1/2 cup chopped onion
1/2 cup chopped celery
4 (14.5 ounce) cans chicken broth ( I used 2 big cartons, about 64 oz I think)
1 (14.5 ounce) can vegetable broth (I will use 2 cans next time)
1/2 pound chopped cooked chicken breast (I used almost a pound of chopped chicken)
1 1/2 cups egg noodles (I used about half a box of fettucine noodles, broken into small pieces)
1 cup sliced carrots
1/2 teaspoon dried basil
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
salt and pepper to taste (I also added a little garlic)


Directions
In a large pot over medium heat, melt butter. Cook onion and celery in butter until just tender, 5 minutes. Pour in chicken and vegetable broths and stir in chicken, noodles, carrots, basil, oregano, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat and simmer 20 minutes before serving.  (I let it simmer on low for about an hour).