Family Favorite: Enchilada Casserole

Normally I make this is in a crockpot but I decided to do it in the oven tonight--either method works great!

Here's the cast!

It's so wonderfully easy--drain a can of corn. Drain and rinse a can of kidney beans or black beans, if you prefer.

Roughly chop a can of black olives and add them to the beans and corn.

If you prefer you can cook the onion to soften it but I love the bite of onion and the baking time is enough softening for me. I used about half an onion.

I had a package of Costco's rotisserie chicken breast in the fridge. Love this for quick meals and it's nice not to have to fight with the whole carcass sometimes.

I added the chicken to the veggies and poured about 1/4 of the enchilada sauce over the mixture. Toss to combine.

To start the layering, put a thin layer of the enchilada sauce in the bottom of a 9x13 pan.

Cut the tortillas in half and layer them onto the sauce. If you want a thicker tortilla layer, go for it! It's not a finicky recipe at all.

Drizzle some sauce.

Add half of the chicken/veggie mixture.

A layer of cheese--the amount is up to you! Repeat the layers--a little sauce, tortillas, a little sauce, chicken/veggie mixture and cheese.

The top layer is tortillas and the rest of the enchilada sauce. Cover with more cheese!

Spray foil with some nonstick so the cheese layer doesn't stick to it, then cover the pan and heat at 350F for 20 minutes. Remove the foil and bake for 10 minutes longer. If you want the cheese to brown further, let it go longer than that but keep an eye on it.

Having an abundance of tortillas (Costco, after all), I thought some home-fried chips would be nice. Once they start to turn golden, they need to be removed quickly. It's amazing how little time it takes for them to go from perfect to oops. I ate those.

Drain them on a rack set in a rimmed pan and as soon as they come out, sprinkle with a little sea salt. I kept pushing the cooked ones to the end of the rack so there was always a free space on the rack for the ones that just came out. I used grapeseed oil but canola or any other vegetable oil would be fine.

The finished casserole! Let it set for about 10 minutes before cutting.

The interesting thing is the enchilada sauce was marked "mild" but there was a fair amount of spice--made me wonder if the label was wrong. Normally I also add a can of green chilies--I'm glad I didn't have a can available because this was spicy enough. 

The homemade chips were out of this world! Chips and salsa (with sour cream) are one of my weaknesses and you can't beat the freshly fried chips. Absolute yum!

No recipe link this time since this is something I just throw together but all the can sizes are standard except for the enchilada sauce which is the large can. So easy to make and to modify to your own tastes!