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Black Bean Pot Pie (or something)
In an effort to whittle down our pantry, I created the following casserole and invited over three other couples (incidentally, by "invited over" I mean "imposed on the Kapoos to host our impromptu dinner party"). It's inspired by the Black Bean Chilaquile recipe in Low-Fat Favorites from the Moosewood Restaurant (which I'd already packed and couldn't have referred to if I'd wanted to), but fairly significantly different from the source material. Here it is:
At least a few hours in advance, make up a hot sauce of some sort. I used two small cans of tomato sauce, a bunch of ground red pepper, black pepper, oregano, onion powder, and garlic powder. It was only modestly successful, but at least didn't detract from the recipe. Put it in the fridge (more time might have helped--I only gave it 4 hours or so).
Brown a bit of ground turkey (it could have been left out--the amount also could have been increased--I used less than a full pound because I wanted some to eat today, but wouldn't use it all) with an onion. When that is almost done, add some garlic. Then add one 14-oz can of tomatoes, two 14-oz cans of black beans, one 16-oz bag of frozen corn, a liberal dose of lime juice, salt, and pepper. Let cook for a while. Thaw one package of frozen spinach.
In a bowl, mix together 1 1/4 c flour, 3/4 c corn meal, 2 tsp baking powder, 1 tsp salt, 1/4 c sugar, and then add to that 1 c milk (using vanilla soymilk--the only milk we had that wasn't long soured--added a nice sweetness, actually), 1/4 c vegetable oil, and 1 egg (beaten). Basically, it was the cornmeal recipe on the cornmeal cannister.
Put the main meat/bean/veggie mixture in the bottom of a 9x12 baking pan. Layer over that the spinach, then the hot sauce (prepared salsa would have been good too), then a mexican cheese blend (or cheddar or whatever), then the corn bread mixture. Bake at 425 for 20-25 minutes. A bit of salsa on the side went very well with it.