One of my friends here at work saw the food I was cooking at lunch one day and was pretty surprised. He kept telling me I should take pictures and write about the process, so this will probably be the first of many posts to come that provide instructions and ideas for cooking in the office.

The first requirement is having a toaster oven. It took a while to talk my employer into buying one. Sure, you can cook a lot of stuff in a microwave, but a toaster oven will open up a lot more possibilities (as you will see from this post and more posts to come).

The people in my office think I'm strange. Some are even starting to call me "Lunch Lady" or "LL" for short. What can I say? I like good food.

Today, I decided to make chicken burritos. That might not sound like much but when you start with raw chicken and attempt to cook that in the office, well, it gets interesting.

The first step is to go shopping for your ingredients. For this meal, I bought the following:

  • Chicken Breast
  • Tortilla’s
  • Refried Beans
  • Taco Seasoning
  • Cheese
  • Hot Sauce
  • Ziploc Bags (I keep a box of these handy)

When you get to the office in the morning cut up your chicken breast into small chunks. Once it cut, I divided it up into two Ziploc bags. I did this because I bought more than I can eat for one meal.

After putting into the Ziploc bags, I added the seasoning as well as a little water. Once added, seal the Ziploc bag and make sure you get the air out. Then you can shake it up to spread the seasoning out amongst all your chicken. Put the bags and the rest of your ingredients in the fridge.

When it is close to lunch time, take out the chicken and start cooking it.

To cook, I created a “dish” with edges on it out of tin foil. I don’t like to do dishes and I didn’t want to make a mess in the toaster oven.

Place the chicken in your “dish” and be sure to evenly spread it out. Put this “dish” into your toaster oven and set it to bake at 425 degrees. Bake for 12-15 minutes (times may vary depending on toaster oven).

When your chicken is close to being done, get the rest of your ingredients out. Microwave a portion of your refried beans as well.

After everything is ready, build your burrito and enjoy!

It takes a little more work than just "heating it up" but it is so much more rewarding.