Enchilada Casserole

This is Lara's sister, Kristina. I don't often post recipes on here because I have two very picky eaters in my house and I tend to make the same tried and true recipes over and over again. So, this past week I was asked to make a casserole for a church function and discovered a wonderful recipe on allrecipes.com for a Mexican casserole and decided to give it a try. I made a few adjustments to the original recipe then made one for church and one for my family. Much to my great surprise both my kids gobbled up the casserole then informed me that they loved it. I was shocked. So, without further ado here is the recipe that received the greatest praise I may have ever received from my children:

Click here for printable recipe.

Enchilada Casserole:

The ingredients:
20 oz. ground turkey
1 pkg. taco seasoning
1/2 cup chopped green onion
1 teaspoon chopped garlic
1 small can (2.25-oz.) sliced black olives
1 small can (4-oz.) diced green chili peppers
1 can (14.5-oz) diced tomatoes
1 can (10-oz.) Ro-tel or salsa
1 (12 oz) jar taco sauce (hot or mild)
2 cans (16-oz. each) refried beans
10 flour tortillas
2-3 cups shredded cheese

Directions:

In a large pan, brown the ground turkey over medium heat. Drain any excess fat. Add the onion, garlic and taco seasoning and saute for a couple more minutes. Mix in the olives, green chili peppers, tomatoes, rotel, taco sauce and refried beans. Stir mixture thoroughly, reduce heat and simmer for 5-10 minutes.
In a 9 x 13 casserole dish spread a layer of the meat mixture with cheese on top and cover with a layer of tortillas (at least 2 thick). Repeat until all meat mixture and tortillas are used up. The top layer should be the meat mixture with cheese on top.

Bake for 20-25 minutes at 350 degrees in a preheated oven. Cheese should be melted and mixture bubbling. Enjoy!


Alternatives for this recipe:
You can use ground beef rather than ground turkey
You can replace the taco sauce with enchilada sauce
You can use 1 can refried beans and 1 can black beans rather than 2 cans of refried beans
You can spice it up by using hot sauce and adding a few jalapeno peppers