Fajita Chicken Tacos with Hot Salsa

We had a friend over last night for dinner, and I decided to take a cue from my recent trip to southern California and make a fresh MexiCali dinner. I didn't make my skillet lasagna as I'd planned. I never look back, it distracts from the now.

I took a cue from Wahoo's and added shredded cabbage to my tacos instead of lettuce. I love this addition, because cabbage has so much more bite than lettuce, and it doesn't water down the flavors. To save time, I bought a bag of finely shredded cole slaw cabbage (in the prepared salad section). It costs 8 times as much as a head of cabbage, but it was a lot easier, cabbage isn't expensive anyway and I had no use for 20 gallons of shredded cabbage.

I served my tacos on Mission low-carb tortillas (fajita size, 1 pt. each) with Kraft 2% Fat Shredded Mexican Cheese. On the side I made Zartarain's Spanish rice mix (4 pts. per cup) and a light spinach salad. I didn't bother making the rice from scratch. I had enough to cook as it is!

The cast iron skillet is key to making the salsa, since I wanted some nice browning on my ingredients. The chicken would have been much better grilled, but I don't have one. I'd also pound the chicken into 1/2" thick cutlets so they cook evenly.

This recipe can be multiplied easily! Have a fiesta!

Fajita Chicken Tacos

8 oz. Boneless Skinless Chicken Breasts
Mojo Marinade (look in your supermarket's ethnic section)
4 Low-Carb Fajita Size Tortillas
1/2 cup 2% Milkfat Shredded Mexican Cheese Blend
1 cup of Hot Salsa, see below
Shredded White Cabbage
1 tbsp. Olive Oil

Marinade the chicken with the Mojo (pronounced Mo-ho) for 1 hour. I use a zip-lock bag to marinade in. You use less marinade this way.

Grill the chicken or brown it in oil in a cast iron skillet. Slice the chicken into strips.

For each taco, put 1/4 of the chicken, a couple of pinches of cabbage, 1/4 cup of salsa and 2 tablespoons of cheese.

Each taco is 5 1/2 points. Makes 4 tacos.

Hot Salsa

1 cup Frozen Corn
1 pkg Cherry Tomatoes, halved
1 1/2 cups Vidalia Onions, diced (about 1 small)
1 handful Fresh Cilantro, chopped
1 tbsp. Lime Juice
1/4 tsp. Tabasco
1 1/2 tbsp. Olive Oil
Salt and Pepper

In a NASA-hot cast iron skillet sprayed with olive oil, toss the corn until it starts to brown and remove. Re-spray with oil and char the tomato halves, being careful not to mash them up too much. Re-spray and cook the onions. They should pick up a lot of color from the leftover bits in the pan.

Toss with remaining ingredients and serve hot! The whole batch is 7 points.

Update 7/4/05 - The first picture in this post was entered in "Does My Blog Look Good in This? #7", an online food photography contest!