Six-Layer Dinner

This was tonight's supper, and it was pretty good!  It's from the church supper cookbook my mom gave me that I've been working through.  The tagline of this recipe says it's "easy, good, inexpensive, and nutritious."  She got 3 out of 4, I guess.  One of the layers is ground beef, which is not inexpensive.  I buy grass-fed beef in bulk from Siberia Farms every few months, and doing it that way makes it be only a tiny bit more expensive than the grocery store ground beef, which is not as healthy.  So I justify spending a bit more on grass-fed, but it's still expensive no matter what the cow was eating prior to his/her demise.  Also, I used my sweet new food processor to slice the potatoes nice and thin, and I think if I didn't have one (or a mandoline slicer thing would work too), then this would have been less easy.  So if you don't have one of those, then this lady's tagline is only 2.5 out of 4 correct for you.  The "good" and the "nutritious" I have no issues with, she is right.

Six-Layer Dinner
2 cups sliced raw potatoes
½ cup raw brown rice (I used white because that's what I had and it was fine)
1 cup sliced onions
1 lb ground beef, browned
2 cups shredded carrots
1 green pepper, seeded and chopped
1 cup chopped celery
½ cup wheat germ (of course being GF I didn't use this so I googled replacements and one was flax meal which I already happened to have so I used that)
4 cups tomato juice
shredded cheese for serving, (Optional)

Preheat oven to 325.  Combine carrots, green pepper, and celery in a bowl; set aside.  Place potatoes in bottom of greased casserole dish (it didn't say size so I guessed and used 11x7...it was not big enough...you should use a 9x13).  Sprinkle with rice.  Cover in layers with the onions, beef, vegetable mixture, and wheat germ/flax meal.  Pour tomato juice over all. 

Cover tightly with foil and bake 2 1/2 hours.  Sprinkle with cheese just before serving if desired.

By the time I realized my chosen casserole dish wasn't big enough, it was too late.  I was too deeply into the layers.  I was afraid if I tried to transfer to a 9x13 that the layers would all mix.  I am too....I don't know....but too "something" to allow that to happen.  So I pressed everything down in and then put a cookie sheet on the rack below the casserole dish, figuring it would boil over some.  It did.  And burnt on badly. Now I have to scrub/soak/scrub/soak/scrub/soak that cookie sheet.  A couple more times and I'm just going to have to throw it out and get another one.  Which would make this recipe even less not inexpensive than it was.

Everybody liked this, although everybody except Steve & Sam picked around the things they didn't like (I mostly didn't eat the green peppers, Nathan & Emma didn't like the celery, onions, or green pepper).  However, Nathan asked for seconds of this, which is almost unheard of for him.  He also asked for thirds but he had somewhere to be, so no time for that.  We also had to add salt to the final product.  I'm sure it could be added at some point during assembly, but I'm not sure where.  Probably better to just let people salt it to taste while they're eating it.  Very yummy and we will have this again, I'm sure.  Especially since Nathan said this is what he wants for his next birthday meal (which is September.......).