My grannys West Texas Green Chili Casserole can be morphed to suit any budget, and pantry, but you gotta have Hatch Green Chili because every thing else tastes wrong and my granny will haunt you.
1 pack of corn tortillias( amount depends on how many you cook for, I cook for 5 ravenous savages, so I use the big packs)
1-2 cans of cream of celery soup
2-4 cans of Hatch diced green chilis mild for those less inclined to toast their taste buds, hot for those of us who have lived in AZ or West Texas a while.
1 diced onion
1lb or so of grated cheese or cheese product or what have you
1 lb or so left over meat,(I have used ground beef, chicken, turkey, leftover steak, and even gone meatless) and used Basmati rice instead when times were tough.
You need a 13x9 cake pan, but I have also used a casserole dish, and a pie tin in a pinch to make this.
Preheat your oven to 350, and then lightly fry each of your tortillias in crisco so that they are soft and pliable and place a layer in the bottom of your chosen pan.
While this is going on, mix the soup and the canned chilis together and heat the mix so it is just bubbling,(add just a little bit of water to thin it) and add extra chili if wanted.
After you have the entire bottom of the pan covered in tortillias, then add some of the soup and chili mixture, just enough to make it kinda moist so that the tortillias dont get all tough and crunchy, then add your meat, cheese, onions and then another layer of tortillias, soup and so on, until you reach the top,(or end of your meat or one of your ingrediants)you then top with a layer of tortillas, pour the remainder of the soup mixture over it and then I top with more cheese and cook for about a half hour.
In all fairness to the $5 rule of this posting, I do buy in bulk because I cook for 6 people every single day, so I can pull this meal in, using leftover meat, for under $5, and even add a salad. We dont do desserts because the ex gained 75 lbs on my cooking when we were married, and he is still trying to lose weight, and I limit all sweets, so usually I cut up a banana or an orange for the kids.
I dont know where my granny got this recipe, but she could whip up a meal to feed 20 people from next to nothing, she grew up on a ranch in West Texas, and married at 13 to escape starvation because she was the 2nd of 14 kids. Her and my Pa were married for 72 years, and I have never met two people that loved each other more, so since she made this for him as a treat, I always tasted the love in it. Hope ya'll like it.