Recipe: Sweet Tamale Pie

This quick and easy Mexican beef, tomato and corn casserole is a perfect one-dish family meal. The casserole relies on its ingredients to provide the flavor… unlike a lot of other Mexican dishes.. this one does not add spices.

The recipe is from people at Hunts. I like my Mexican food with some kick to it.. but as Warren pointed out.. a lot of tamales are not made with spices… so I resisted the temptation to tinker with the recipe and left it as is. It was a bit bland for my tastes the night we had this.. but oddly enough, I ate the leftovers the next day for lunch and really liked it…

I did make a change, rather than using only 1 cup of corn, I used the whole can… we did not find it to be too much and I didn’t want to have any leftover corn to use.

TIPS

As I mentioned, this recipe does not use the typical Mexican spices.. which may work best for families that have members that are not fond of spicy food…

If you want to spice it up.. you can always add some Fajita Seasoning … I have a terrific recipe for Fajita seasoning that I make and fill a jar with… then whenever I want to add some spice to some Mexican dishes.. I add a bit… click the link for my seasoning recipe.

Make sure you drain the tomatoes and corn well, otherwise you will have excess liquid in the pie plate, which isn't a tremendous problem, but if you want it to look perfect, drain them well.

I recommend you let the casserole stand 5 minutes before cutting. The first serving did not come out of the pie plate perfectly. The rest of the servings cut easily and stayed in wedges.

You will need to use a large spoon to scoop out the serving to keep the filling together since nothing really binds it.

This makes 4 large servings or 6 average size servings.






Recipe: Sweet Tamale Pie

All you need:

1 pound lean ground beef
1 medium onion, chopped
1 medium green pepper, chopped
2 cloves of garlic, minced
1 can (14.5 oz.) Hunts diced Tomatoes, drained and divided
1 can whole kernel corn
1 can (4 oz.) diced green chilies, divided
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon ground black pepper
1 egg
1/3 cup reduced fat (2%) milk
1 pkg. (8.5 oz.) corn muffin mix
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
Cooking oil spray

All you need to do:

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Spray a 9 inch pie plate with the cooking oil spray. Set aside.

In a large skillet, over medium high heat, brown the meat with the onions, garlic and green pepper.

Drain the mixture.

Remove ¼ cup tomatoes from the can and set aside.

Add the remaining tomatoes, corn, ½ of the can of chilies the skillet and season with salt and pepper. Mix well.

Reduce the heat and simmer for 5 minutes.

Spoon the mixture into the prepared pie plate.

In a medium bowl, beat the egg with the milk. Add the corn muffin mix and stir until just moistened.

Add the reserved tomatoes, chilies and cheese, mix well.

Spoon the mixture evenly over the beef.

Place the pie plate on a baking sheet and bake at 400 degrees F for 20 to 30 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Let stand 5 minutes then cut into wedges and serve.