Taco Pie

So this pie is basically the same thing you get in the Old el Paso Taco Pie box. But, it has more vegetables in it and it doesn't contain that scary taco seasoning that I'm sure is just sodium. It does contain that awful cheese sauce though in the form of Salsa con Queso. Unfortunately, this last time I made this I didn't enjoy it as much. They've changed the cheese sauce that I normally buy and much to my surprise, when I sampled it, it had absolutely no flavour. So, my dish was a bit bland to say the least. But, maybe it was just a faulty jar (at least that's what I'm telling myself, instead of that they changed their recipe). I might have to resort to making my own sauce at some point, but for now I'm going to try stick with the jar stuff simply for convenience. Not that it would be hard to combine velveeta and salsa to make the sauce myself.

Anyway, turns out I didn't have an adequately deep round pan to get the required four layers in. So my pie may look slightly strange because it only has two layers (I had to split it up into two shallow pie pans), but it still works just as well.

After I made this dish this past week I got to thinking that you could easily make this into a vegetarian option (not that I have any desire to go vegetarian), but using black beans instead of the beef. Just a thought.

So, the idea for this comes from Old el Paso, but really everything else is my own creation.

Serves 5

Ingredients

1 1/2 lb. Ground Beef

1/2 Onion, diced

1 1/2 C. Salsa con Queso (or whatever cheese sauce you decide upon)

1 1/4 C. Salsa

1/2 Tsp. Cumin

1 Tsp. Chili Peppers

4 Soft Tortillas

2 Tomatoes, diced

1/2 Bell Pepper, diced

1/2 C. Corn Kernels

1 C. Cheese, grated

Directions

~Heat skillet and cook beef and onions until cooked through.

~Add in cheese sauce, salsa, cumin & chilis

~Preheat oven to 350 F.

~Place 1 tortilla into a greased round dish (make sure the tortilla fills the dish)

~Layer with 1/4 of the beef mixture, vegetables and cheese.

~Top with another tortilla and repeat until you have four layers with the meat, veggies and cheese on top.

~Put in oven and bake until heated through and cheese is bubbly, approximately 15 minutes.

Enjoy