Grandpa Gotta Cook—Mexican Casserole

Have you ever had deja vu all over again?

On this week's edition of Grandpa Gotta Cook, we'll explore that strange feeling you get that you've done something before, but for the life of you, you can't figure out when.

[Cue theme music].

You cook long enough, things start to blend together, and it's possible to think you've already cooked something and potentially written about it for Food Fight Friday. Or, at least that's what's happening to me as I write this post. I think I know why. I'll share that little mystery tidbit in a moment.

Lately, I haven't been cooking on Saturdays, but this past Sunday it actually fell upon me to get a meal prepared, so I went back to the handy dandy crockpot to come up with the meal. The main objective was to use the ingredients that were already available at home, since I would only have a short window of opportunity to get it prepared because my wife and I would be gone for a few hours while it was cooking.

After looking through different recipes, I decided on one that met the ingredient requirements that I hoped everyone would like. The name of the dish? Mexican Casserole.

As you can see, the ingredients list called for onion, bell pepper, chili powder, diced tomato, tomato sauce, kidney beans, taco seasoning, and not pictured: ground beef, rice and grated cheddar cheese.

I'll just note here that calling this Mexican Casserole isn't quite what I would have called it. In 32 years of being around or married into the culture, I've not once seen anything resembling this. Ground beef is not a regular staple, and while it does have rice and beans, bell peppers are regional, tomato sauce isn't really used, and taco seasoning would be a salsa.

Just sayin'.

As with the other crockpot ground beef meals, the meat gets browned up first in a pan, then everything except for the rice and cheese goes in. The recipe was for cooking on low for 4-6 hours. For us, it would be the four hours. At the end of that, instant rice was supposed to go in and cook for 30 minutes. We didn't have instant rice, so my son graciously accepted the duty of cooking the regular rice in a rice cooker (since that's what he knows and does best). The rice would be added to the rest of the ingredients, stirred in, and voila, Mexican Casserole.

Only, without the Mexican.

Back To The Deja Vu

I made a Chicken Burrito Casserole a while back that also had rice, so that's what I was remembering when I made this. The flavor of the rice came out more or the less the same this time as then. I think I commented that it tasted more like Spanish rice from my school lunch days than it did Mexican rice my wife makes. Same held true this time around, even though the taco seasoning has a different flavor.

Taste Test

It was very good. Everyone liked it, including my wife, who told me I needed to make it again. When she says that, it means it's a winner, and then I have to convince her that making it two nights in a row isn't a good thing. Thankfully, there was plenty of leftovers for her to take for her lunch and get her fill.

I think if I would change anything, it would be the proportions. Rice seemed to dominate, while the meat and beans kind of disappeared. I'd probably double them or halve the rice. Something like that, so that there's a more even distribution of meat, beans and rice.

Overall, though, a very tasty meal, and one I will keep for another round.

And somehow avoid deja vu. And maybe call it Southwest Casserole. Or something.

_{Images courtesy of Glen Anthony Albrethsen}

This Grandpa Gotta Cook post is published in conjunction with Food Fight Friday, a weekly contest for food lovers on STEEM. If you would like to participate, all you gotta do is write about food, post it on Friday (your time), use the #fff tag, and then go and read other entries. You'll probably want to vote on your favorite later, since participants choose the winner. SBI shares is the weekly prize.