So there I was in my kitchen wondering what to make for dinner for my family when I read about the hatch chile festival going on. Naturally, I went and spent more money than I had planned because as it turns out, I’m obsessed with hatch chiles. This was actually the first of many hatch recipes I made with my newfound loves, but I’ll tell you about that later.

As I said I’m standing there with the freezer door open wondering how many different ways I can cook the rest of our deer meat so that I can make room for this year’s incoming (I mean, who doesn’t have that problem?) and I decide to put my peppers and deer meat together in an enchilada. Yum! It isn’t rocket science and certainly no new ground was stomped out here with a basic cheese sauce, but it’s what’s on the inside that counts, right?

Ingredients:
1 lb ground meat (I used deer, but if that’s not your bag you can use beef)
1 package smoked sausage (I used Eckridge)
1 can black beans drained
1 can corn drained OR 1-2 ears roasted corn cut off the cob
1 sweet onion (1015, honeydew, Vidalia, whatever you like)
2-3 cloves chopped garlic
Small package processed cheese (I like Velveeta sharp cheddar)
1/2 – 3/4 cup milk
4-5 roasted diced green chiles or 2 small cans diced green chiles
1 can diced tomatoes
Green onions
Tortillas
Your favorite seasonings (whatever you use just make sure it has salt, pepper, and garlic in it)

1. Sauté onion on medium to high heat for 10-12 minutes until translucent. Then add meat and chopped garlic and season with favorite seasonings. Meanwhile, make your husband go outside and fire up the grill for that package of Eckridge sausage I told you about. Your husband isn’t home? You don’t have a grill? Well then yes you can skip this step if you would rather cook sausage separately in a cast iron skillet or something that will leave a nice char on it. Once that’s done chop into bite sized pieces.

2. Once the meat is finished cooking combine sausage, ground meat mixture, 1-2 of the diced green chiles or 1 can of chiles, corn, and black beans and turn the heat off.

3. In a small sauce pot on low to medium heat melt Velveeta with milk, can of drained diced tomatoes, and rest of the diced chiles. Stir occasionally. Once completely melted turn heat off.

4. Pre-heat your oven to 350. Get out two 9×11 baking dishes and spray with non-stick cooking spray. Begin stuffing your enchiladas but putting 1-2 spoonfuls of meat mixture in each tortilla. Roll up and place firmly at one end of your baking dish. Each dish should hold about ten enchiladas.**Note** I had more than 20 enchiladas so I froze 6 more in pairs of 2’s in little microwave safe dishes. Then I put plastic wrap and foil on them and freeze for when I’m out of town for my husband or when I just don’t feel like cooking. I pull them out and they defrost on the counter for a couple hours and then I pop into oven to heat them up. It’s also what I do to the additional baking dish of 10 enchiladas. They freeze great!**

5. Pour cheese sauce all over enchiladas. Pop in the oven for about 15 minutes until bubbly. Take out and serve with your favorite toppings (chopped green onions, black olives, pico de gallo, whatever). Enjoy!