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This Mexican lasagna will last up to five days in the refrigerator. It’s a terrific make-ahead meal!

Ingredients

• olive oil cooking spray
• 2 pound uncooked boneless, skinless chicken breast
• 30 ounces of canned black beans: rinsed and drained
• 3 cups fat-free sour cream
• 2 cup shredded reduced-fat Mexican-style cheese: divided
• 8 ounces of chopped green chilies (two 4-ounce cans)
• 2 teaspoons of ground cumin
• 1/2 teaspoon of black pepper
• 12 medium corn tortilla(s): cut into 2-inch strips
• 1 cup salsa: mild, medium or hot

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350ºF. Coat a lasagna pan with cooking spray.
• Place chicken in medium saucepan and fill with enough cold water just to cover chicken. Set pan over high heat and bring to a boil. Reduce heat to medium and simmer until chicken is cooked through, about 10 to 15 minutes; drain. When chicken is cool enough to handle, cut into 1-inch pieces.
• Transfer chicken to a large bowl and add beans, sour cream, 1 cup of shredded cheese, chilies, cumin, and pepper; mix well and set aside.
• Arrange half of tortillas in bottom of prepared lasagna pan, overlapping pieces to cover surface. Top tortillas with half of chicken mixture, layer with remaining tortillas and then top with remaining chicken mixture. Sprinkle with remaining cup of cheese.
• Bake until filling is bubbly and cheese is melted, about 30 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes before slicing into 12 pieces. Serve with salsa on the side.

This dish, despite being messy and hard to cut into 12 pieces (I think I got 11, uneven servings) was SO tasty! The salsa wasn’t needed, but it was a nice complement.

Some things I found:
- 30 ounces is a hella lot of black beans, especially for someone who is JUST learning to like these little guys. I bought 2 big cans of 13 ounce beans and used 1 and a bit of the other. I saved the rest to hopefully use in another recipe soon.

Garlicy, cheesy bread crumbs top tender spinach in this versatile side dish. It’s so easy to make, too, thanks to bagged baby spinach.

Ingredients

Directions

• Heat 1 teaspoon of oil in a large nonstick skillet. Add bread crumbs and cook over medium heat, stirring often, until golden, about 3 minutes. Remove from heat; stir in Parmesan cheese. Spoon bread crumbs into a small bowl; set aside.
• Heat remaining 1/4 teaspoon of oil in same skillet. Add garlic, cook, stirring, until fragrant, about 30 seconds. Gradually add half of spinach to skillet, tossing mixture and adding more spinach as some of it cooks down. Continue cooking and tossing, until spinach is wilted and tender, about 2 to 3 minutes. Remove from skillet and repeat with remaining spinach.
• Return cooked spinach to skillet; add salt and toss over low heat. Transfer to a serving bowl and sprinkle with crumbs. Or toss with half of crumbs and sprinkle remaining crumbs over each serving. Yields about 3/4 cup of spinach and 2 tablespoons of crumbs per serving.

Some things I found:
- I used 2 bags of prewashed spinach, so washing/drying wasn’t need. Some chopping might have been useful, as the stems on some of these bad boys were out of control.

- I went ahead and took the lazy way out for the bread crumbs and bought a box of Panko. Unfortunately, after 3-4 minutes in the frying pan, they hadn’t browned. Hmmm.

When I had this with dinner, it was so-so. I ate it quickly so I could savor the taste of the Chicken dish without it being “marred.” It wasn’t awful though - just not as good as the Mexican delight.

I brought some to work as a snack the next day and after 1 bite, decided “maybe heating this up will help.” After 2 bites of heated spinach, the rest went into the garbage. The leftovers at home will meet the same fate.

I don’t know what went wrong with this dish, or if that’s just how it tasted. But it was… not pleasant. If you love spinach, give it a try. Maybe I just don’t love non-cheesy artichoke dip spinach enough to like this?weightwatchers.com

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