Taco Layer Casserole

I can't believe I missed a taco Tuesday.  I really only missed blogging about it.  Our standing Taco Tuesday date was awesome - Chicken Tacos and Frozen Lemon Drop Cocktails.  But we may have had a lemon drop too many as we were half way through eating before we remembered (okay when I say "we" I mean my much more responsible friend we were eating with) that we were supposed to photograph the food.  Since I was already days behind on the blog, I decided that it was just a really bad week for blogging.

You see, if this blog wasn't a thinly-veiled recipe blog, this post would actually be called The Big Fight.  Except that in food blog world, I don't think women fight with their husbands.  Ever.  So while you and I will know it as The Big Fight, for blogging purposes we'll call it The Big Discussion.

It has been one of those weeks at my house where absolutely everything most essential has either been broken (the air conditioning for example) or lost (the one set of car keys that I keep promising to copy).  The little Bells have a new saying that they saw on a preview for Ratatouille - would you like to know what it is?  "Shut up and eat your garbage."  Um, yes.  They say it and say it and say it.  And even if I may have laughed in surprise the first time, I'm not laughing anymore.  So suffice it to say there have been lots of discussions in the Dinner Bell household this week.

After a particularly loud discussion day, I couldn't stop thinking of a certain clip from one of my very favorite movies, "Something to Talk About".  Remember when the aunt or grandma or someone gives her the recipe for a special dinner?  And he nearly dies of food poisoning?   Yes, that one.  Except the Days of the Great Discussion in the our house were nothing like catching your husband in an affair with one of your so-called friends from the Ladies' Society.  So, you know, my lesson was on a different caliber.

I told you how Mr. Bell thinks I make tacos too much, right?  And sandwiches.  So you know what I did?  I made them both.  On the same day.  Well, not exactly because that would have been obvious and possibly passive aggressive.  So I took taco ingredients and layered them in a baking dish and served them with a smile.  Just waiting for a comment about the "taco-ness" of the dish.  But guess what?  It never came.  He loved it.  It goes without saying that I loved it as it was full of taco-ness.

Taco Layer Casserole


1 lb ground beef or turkey
1 small onion, chopped
14 oz can refried black beans
10 oz red enchilada sauce
8 oz salsa
10 corn tortillas
2 cups cheddar cheese
Sour cream and green onion to garnish

Preheat oven to 375.  In large skillet brown meat and onion.  Season with salt and pepper.  Drain well and then mix in refried beans, enchilada sauce and salsa.  Stir together and simmer about ten minutes.

While simmering, cut tortillas in half.  Spray them with nonstick spray and put half of them in the bottom of the casserole dish.  Put half of the meat mixture on tortillas and top with half of the cheese.  Repeat.  Bake about 15 minutes and serve topped with sour cream and green onions.  Yum!

And now for the rest of the story....  The taco casserole was lunch.  For dinner, I was heading straight into Part 2 of my Lesson Plan - the steak sandwich.  I often read other blogs and there are tons of recipes that I always want to try.  Over on The Pioneer Woman, there is a sandwich called the Marlboro Man Sandwich.  It has been on my list of things to make for months - maybe it's the cute cowboy pictures, I don't know.  I made the recipe as she wrote it except for the butter - as mad as I was, I could not, in clear conscience feed my husband an entire stick or two of butter for dinner.  Well, he liked this too.  So while my lesson didn't work as planned, a couple of stick-to-the-ribs meals later, Mr. Bell was too well fed to continue any discussions. Not that I'm keeping score, but I won.