Slow Cooker Enchiladas

Whenever I know I am going to be cooking I usually do 1 of 2 things:  1-peruse the cabinets to see what we have on hand and figure out what I can without having to go to the store, or 2-peruse my Pinterest pins to see what I really want to make.  Last night, I decided see what we had on hand and decide on my recipe that way.  The main things I saw were ground beef and corn tortillas, and I figured that surely I could come up with a casserole-type dish.  The problem is, our oven is not acting right, and I didn't want to mess with it, so I searched for crockpot recipes that included my ingredients of choice.  I came up with this recipe for crockpot enchiladas.  Normally, I am not interested in crockpot recipes that require to cook first, and then add cooked food to the crockpot-to me, that almost negates the reason for using the crockpot.  However, with knowing the circumstances of not wanting to use the oven, I was willing to try this recipe.  I cooked up the taco meat last night.

When I got home tonight, I heated it back up in the microwave, and proceeded with the recipe.  I struck again-thinking I had all the ingredients on hand, but realistically that was not the case.  When I checked the fridge yesterday, I saw 3 open jars of salsa.  Today, it turned out that 1 jar had an inch left in the bottom, one jar had mold, and tho other I had assumed to be salsa was actually queso-apparently I should have pulled it up to the front of the fridge instead of just seeing the lid in the very back and making an assumption.  So I used the i inch of salsa called for in the recipe, and used a (drained) can of diced tomato to keep me from having to run back to the store.  The recipe came together fairly quickly, so all I had to do was wait an hour.  If you plan to make this, plan to wait the whole hour for all the cheese to melt.

It turned out pretty good-I think if I had used all salsa it would have been better. This is definitely a recipe to keep!

Here is the recipe from the All Recipes website:

• 1 pound lean ground beef
• 10 (6 inch) corn tortillas, quartered
• 1 (1 ounce) package taco seasoning mix
• 1 1/4 cups water

• 1 (12 ounce) jar chunky salsa
• 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of mushroom soup
• 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of chicken soup
• 4 cups shredded Mexican cheese blend

1. Crumble the ground beef into a skillet over medium-high heat. Cook and stir until evenly browned. Add taco seasoning and water; simmer for 15 minutes over low heat.
2. In a medium bowl, stir together the salsa, cream of mushroom soup and cream of chicken soup. Mix in most of the cheese, reserving 3/4 cup for later.
3. Place a layer of tortillas covering the bottom of a slow cooker. Scoop a layer of the ground beef over that, and then spoon a layer of the cheese mixture. Repeat the layers until you run out of stuff, ending with a layer of tortillas on the top. Top with remaining cheese.
4. Cover, and cook on High for 45 minutes to 1 hour.