Ariba!

Last week I finally had a go at Pioneer Woman's mexican lasagna, which Sharon's been raving about and trying to convince me to make. I gotta say, the recipe is REALLY good, but DO take note that it's scaled to serve 20+, and I just skimmed it in a hurry before leaving work, printed out the ingredients, and didn't realize how many it was supposed to feed. I suppose the 3lbs of ground beef and 4 cups of rice should've been a clue?

If you're making the seasoned rice from scratch, you first saute onions, garlic and tomatoes til tender.



And then add in chili powder, cumin and paprika...


And then combine this with rice that you cooked separately in chicken broth (bastmati rice was great for this sort of dish). Stir in a can or two of black beans also -mmm!


Separately, you want to take a large quantity of ground beef...


Fry it up, and seasong it with cumin, chili power and paprika as well, adding a little water to make it a bit more moist and saucy.


Then start layering goodies in a large casserole dish: salsa verde, flour tortillas, seasoned rice, cheese, enchilada sauce, more tortillas, seasoned beef, more seasoned rice, more salsa verde if you have room, and more cheese. Oh, and some corn can go in between a couple of layers if you think your casserole dish is tall enough.


Mmmm....even unbaked it looks really good!


Then just bake til bubbly! Sprinkle on some cilantro, and sour cream if you like. Here I had it with mexican corn cake (hey, there was no room to work corn INTO the casserole!)