Shredded Chicken Taco Salad

I love taco salad.  Layers of great flavor all together on top of chips or in a bowl.  I have always made my mom's version that is ground beef that is cooked down and then you add Catalina dressing to it.  It is the version that I grew up on and love.

We always have a surplus of flour tortillas in our house and I can't really ever find enough uses for them before they go stale.  I decided last week that I was finally going to attempt to make my own taco salad bowls. 

After researching how to make taco salad bowls, I realized how easy would be to do.  The more I cook, the more I realize that the things I thought would be hard to make from scratch are really super easy and they taste so much better than the stuff that you buy in the grocery store.

Taco Salad bowls
Makes 2 Salad bowls
recipe from Food.com

Ingredients
2 small tortillas (taco ones)
2 pieces aluminum foil (12-inch)
1/2 teaspoon olive oil
2 aluminum cans

Directions
1) Drape a foil square over the top of each can.
2) Fill a pizza pan or another rimmed container with about 1/2 inch of warm water and add 1/2 teaspoon of olivee oil.
3) Quickly immerse a tortilla in water and then lift out and drape over the foil on the empty food can.
4)  Bake the shell in a preheated 450 degree oven until they're light brown and firm, about 10 minutes.
5)  Carefully lift the shells off the cans and flip them over so that they brown the part that was on the can.  Bake for 1-2 more minutes.

Taco Salad filling
Ingredients
2 pieces of chicken
2 cups Orange juice
Cumin
Cilantro
1/4 cup lime juice
1 tablespoon of garlic

Directions
1) Place chicken and other ingredients into a slow cooker and let them cook on low for 6 hours.
2) Pull chicken out and shred it.
3) Combine chicken with other desired "toppings".  Ours consisted of lettuce, black beans, corn, jalapenos, cheese, sour cream, and guacamole.

I love the flavor of the chicken after it comes out of the crock pot.  It is nice and tender and comes out with a hint of the lime juice flavor.  The shell turned out perfect.  It was crunchy and supported any toppings that you put on it.  The corn and blackbeans added a little extra filling to it.  The jalapeno added just a little heat.  They turned out perfect, and I'll definitely be making my own taco shells again.