Mexican Fiesta Revisited

My favorite Mexican dish to cook is a Mexican Lasagna.  Not very traditional, I know, but it's everything I love about Mexican food all in one awesome dish so I can't help myself from making it time after time.  I usually get one chance to make this classic after each visit to the US because I bring back enough corn tortillas, spices, etc for a one time use.  So to celebrate the agotaring of my stock, I invite all the peeps over and have a feast.  This time I made Mexican rice and homemade refried black beans to go along side.  Check out the recipes below and get cooking!

Stewing the chicken in tomato sauce

Cooked chicken before shredding

Shredded chicken

Rice before adding liquid

Sauteed onions for beans

Cooked onions ready to add to beans

Chicken filling

Mexican Lasagna

A bit of everything

Somehow hats got involved

And we all took a turn with the hats

Mexican Lasagna - Ingredients and directions can be found in my previous blog post.

Mexican Rice - I was inspired by this recipe (ignore the website name), but use all the stewing liquid from my chicken to cook the rice.  Whatever faltas, add water.

Refried Black Beans - 500 grams of dried beans soaked overnight.  Rinse them and cover with water.  Bring water to a boil and then simmer until cooked through.  About 2 hours.  I boil them with some salt, garlic powder, chili powder, and bay leaves.  Drain once done and return to pot.  You can do this a day ahead of time if you want.

In a separate pan saute chopped onion, garlic, a jalapeno in about a 1/4 stick of butter.  When the onions are cooked through, add to beans and mash until they are re-fried looking.  This is probably not the technique whatsover, but it's my interpretation.