Enchirotos?

The local grocery store in my area sends out coupons every now and again. Attached to these coupons are some recipes which are surely meant to encourage you to purchase the ingredients with the attached coupons. Pretty smart idea. Normally I peruse these recipes without much thought, because I try not to fall for every marketing scheme that comes my way...but when I saw this, I immediately thought of the enchilada sauce I had in the pantry from when I bought two cans by accident. I also thought of those leftover black olives I still had in my fridge. And leftover refried beans from one of my cooking with friends. So that was three ingredients down that I could use up. And of course, I always have cheese and onions. Basically this meant all I had to do was pick up some taquitos.

Taquito-Enchilada Bake (from Ralphs)

1 box steak and cheese taquitos, partially thawed
1 can enchilada sauce
1 1/2 cups shredded Mexican blend cheese
1 can refried beans (I obviously used less, probably closer to 1/2 cup)
1/3 cup green onions, sliced
1/3 cup red onions, diced
1 can black olives (again, I used about 1/4 cup)

1) Preheat oven to 375. Pour 1/3 of the enchilada sauce into a lightly greased baking dish.

2) Arrange 1/2 of the taquitos over enchilada sauce.

4) Evenly spread heated refried beans over taquitos.

5) Layer 1/3 more sauce.

6) Add 1/2 the red onions

7) Add 1/2 the green onions

8) Add half the shredded cheese.

9) Top with remaining taquitos.

10) Add the last of the enchilada sauce. Bake, covered for 25 minutes.

11) The last 5 minutes, top with remaining cheese. Garnish with remaining onions and olives.

These made a great dinner! (Actually 2 dinners....it might even have been three, but Thatboy had 2 helpings the first night and then got upset that he had to share with me the second night). They're a great mix between taquitos and enchiladas. I liked the small size of the taquitos, and that they were baked and not fried any more than they were before freezing. The enchilada sauce made them nice and soft. Topped with some cool whipped cream and it was a fiesta in Thathouse.