Impromptu Chili Cheese Fries

Hey again food blog readers! Our massive chicken taco project is still in the works, but fear not, it's going to be here soon. In the mean time we've made quite a few delicious things that need to be shown to the world. A few weekends back I was craving something to snack on while spending an unnecessary amount of time playing video games (the original SNES version of Lufia and the PC game Septerra Core, for anyone who is interested in that sort of thing). I knew I wanted something involving potatoes, but wasn't feeling like chips, so I decided to whip up some chili fries with the potatoes we had sitting on the counter.

Halfway through, I realized we didn't actually have any chili, so I had to improvise. What I ended up with was wedges of potatoes seasoned with chili powder, garlic powder, and red pepper flakes. I cut up strips of red bell pepper and threw on green onion and "mozzarella" flavored rice cheese (basically tastes like slices of American cheese). When it popped out of the oven I knew I was onto something and we decided to make it the basis of an another meal later that week.


For a meal based around the oh-so-delicious, not-exactly-nutritious chili fries we wanted to ramp it up a notch and make it worthy of a food blog. First Megan seasoned chicken thighs (way more tender than breasts) and broiled them. After pulling them out she cut them up into thin slices to put on top of the home made fries.


As with last time we also baked red pepper and green onions with the potato wedges. This time we didn't bake the cheese on, as we wanted to have a sort of assembly line where everyone could add whatever they wanted on top.


Here's all the various ingredients to put on the fries and the side salad. There's avacado, chicken strips, shredded cheddar and mozzarella, hard boiled egg slices, tomato, mandarin oranges, cucumber, sour cream, and hot sauce. For anyone wondering why that isn't Cholula - well, we ran out and I wanted to try something different. Tapatio probably won't be replacing Cholula for me, but it is significantly spicier and has a nice kick.

Here's the first layer of the fries with a dollop of chili and a generous handful of chicken strips tossed on top.

To finish off my plate of fries I put sour cream, sprinkled cheese, and then threw on a whole lot of hot sauce.


Here's the finished meal with my salad, using tomatoes, eggs, avocado, and some more of the chicken. It's not pictured here, but I topped it off with green goddess dressing.



That's it for this week! Check back soon for our latest creation (impromptu or planned - who knows?) and the soon to arrive "War in heaven chicken taco" videos! For anyone who missed them, you can see the original teasers for the chicken tacos at here, here, and finally here!