Yummy Taco Casserole

If I put yummy in the title then you know I really liked it.

I was trying to use up stuff. We had three open bags of tortilla chips in our pantry, a partially used tomato, three open jars of salsa, plus two large open bags of shredded cheddar cheese in our fridge.

So I bought @ 2 pounds ground beef (a little less) and a head of iceberg lettuce.

I cooked the beef with the contents of two of the salsa jars (and I will ONLY use powdered taco mix again if we are surviving on food storage only), heated a can of refried beans, cut up half of the head of lettuce and the  leftover tomato, oh, and opened a can of sliced black olives.

Then I layered a large roasting pan with the refried beans (heated first in the microwave for about a minute to make them easier to spread), most of the ground beef mixture, olives, tomato, some tortilla chips, then lots of cheese.

Baked in the oven at 350 for, maybe 10 minutes, just to get the cheese melted nicely.

At the table we added lettuce and more chips if we wanted.

It was really, really good.

No sour cream! The refried beans added enough creaminess.

I still have lots of salsa and chips and cheese, so next week I may cook some frozen chicken breasts in the crockpot with salsa and try it with the chicken.

The leftover meat was mixed with leftover rice and made a very yummy lunch the next two days.

Bonus!