Beef Enchiladas

3 cans red enchilada sauce (I strongly recommend La Preferida brand, in the white and red can)
1 large can diced tomatoes
12 corn tortillas
3 c. shredded cheddar cheese
1-1/2 lbs. ground beef
1 medium sized onion, chopped
vegetable oil (for softening tortillas)
green onion for garnish

Preheat oven to 425.
Brown beef with onion in saute pan. Drain off fat. Dump in bowl.
Open enchilada sauce, dump in a bowl.
Open tomatoes, drain well, dump in a bowl.
Open cheese, dump in a bowl.
Get out a 9 x 13 baking pan.
In a small frying pan, heat just enough oil to cover bottom of pan. Medium to medium high heat should be good.

Tear off 2 square pieces of aluminum foil. One at a time, put tortillas in oil. Fry just a few seconds, flip, fry a few seconds more. Remove to aluminum foil, covering each time with the other piece of foil. You'll end up with a stack of soft, warm tortillas in between two pieces of foil to keep them warm and soft.
When tortillas are all finished, you're ready to roll.
Place a tortilla in the sauce, covering both sides, then lay it in the 9 x 13 pan. Put a handful of ground beef in there, down the middle. Top with a handful of tomatoes and a handful of cheese. Roll up. Repeat until all tortillas are tucked nicely together in the pan. (Messy job.)
You can put any remaining tomatoes, meat, sauce, and cheese on top.
Bake at 425 about 30 or 40 minutes till bubbly.
Top with chopped green onions if desired.
Serve with refried beans and rice.

Stuffed Peppers

OK. Should have taken the picture before we started eating them. Sorry. Nevertheless...

4 Green Bell Peppers (all about the same size, all nicely shaped so they'll sit on the pan)
1 lb. lean ground beef
1 medium yellow onion, chopped
1 large can tomato sauce
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 c. cooked rice
2 c. shredded mozzarella cheese

Carefully cut the top stems off of the peppers, then reach in with a spoon and scrape out all the membranes and seeds (compost or throw those parts away). Put the peppers in a pot of boiling water for just about 3 or 4 minutes. Remove them from the water. Drain on a rack. (The peppers will be little bowls for the filling)

Prepare a pan to cook the peppers in by spreading about 1/4 c of the tomato sauce across the bottom. This will prevent the peppers from sticking to the pan as they bake. Place the peppers, standing with the hole on top, in the prepared pan.

In a large frying pan, brown ground beef and onion till beef is no longer pink and onion is translucent. Add garlic. Cook another minute or two. Remove from heat.

Add tomato sauce to the beef mixture and stir. Next, stir in however much cooked rice looks good. Add some rice, stir, taste. Repeat till you're satisfied with beef to rice ratio.

Spoon the meat/rice mixture into the peppers, filling each pepper about half way.

Put 2 or 3 T of mozzarella on top of the filling in each pepper.

Then fill the peppers up to the top with the meat mixture. Top each with cheese. I spread any extra filling around the peppers in the pan.

Bake at 400 about 30 minutes, till cheese is bubbly. (Don't forget there's cheese deep inside each pepper, too. So give that time to get good and hot.)

Spread