Gourmet Chicken Tacos

To say my mom and I had a large time in NYC this past weekend would be an insult to the word "large." We made new friends, we visited old friends, we saw shows, we drank drinks. Fact of the matter is that we really didn't eat anything spectacular. Part of that was my fault: I had a 4 day hangover that prevented anything but water.

On our way home we stopped at some little taco stand in the Charlotte airport and grabbed a couple of tacos. Honestly I've never eaten anything as good. I'm even a little embarrassed to admit that. I decided that it would be necessary for me to recreate these at home so here's what I did.

We'll start with the chicken. I placed a whole chicken in a big pot. around the chicken I stuffed a few lime and lemon wedges, a handful of cilantro, some salt and pepper and filled with water. This cooked for about 2 hours on med. When the chicken was done I put it aside and reserved liquid. Once the chicken could be pulled I heated a tablespoon of chili oil in a pan and added chicken, some of the reserved liquid, about a table spoon of chili powder, a teaspoon of paprika, a dash of cumin, some all purpose seasoning and salt. Close to the end, I added a pat of butter and let this simmer.

On to the cheese sauce:

I melted 2 t. of butter and added 2 t of flour and cooked until my child hit her head and everything got put on hold. When I resumed, I added strained cooking liquid and then cheese. I used mexican quesadilla cheese and some other unidentified white cheese. This was allowed to simply simmer for about 20 minutes until everything melted.

Chili sauce:
1 can of tomatoes, 1/2 cup of vinegar, 1 cup of sugar, jalapenos to taste. cook until tomatoes are shiny and delicious.

Tortillas

turns out that these are best if steamed over the last of the reserve liquid.

to assemble:

steamed tortillas, cheese mix, stewed chicken, shredded lettuce, sprigs of cilantro, squeeze of lime, spoon of sour cream, tease of chili sauce.

Seriously. The best ever. I'm going to substitute pulled pork next. I think it's going to be AWESOME!