Taco Cornbread Casserole - Take 1

A couple people have expressed interest in the Taco Cornbread Casserole I made this past week. As I mentioned previously, I think it still needs a little work, but I figured I'd go ahead and share what I did and some of my ideas for next time.

This started because I had a zillion pouches of cornbread mix in my cupboard that have been there since the dawn of time or so (that's when cornbread was invented, right?), and since I am on a quest to use up all such strange things from my cupboards, I had to figure out something to do with it. And if I really liked eating plain old cornbread, well it wouldn't have been sitting in my cupboard for so long, now would it? :)

So here's what I did:

The weekend before last I had prepared some taco meat and froze it in 1 lb packages. So I took 1 lb of prepared taco meat (thawed), diced up a small green bell pepper and medium tomato from my garden, about 1/3 cup of mixed cheddar and monterey jack cheese, and mixed all that up in a 13x9 dish. Then I prepared 2 of the cornbread pouch mixes (they are small pouches that make 6 muffins each) as directed on the package, and then poured the cornbread mix on top of the meat mixture. I cooked it at 350 for about 25-30 minutes (until the cornbread was done).

It was pretty tasty, but I think there was too much cornbread. What I will probably do next time is use the same amount of meat, put it in an 8x8 pan, and use only one package of cornbread mix on top. I also think it needs more veggies - more bell pepper and tomato, and possibly some onion. I may even mix some salsa in - some extra moisture would probably be an improvement. I will also add more cheese next time, I wasn't quite sure how the cheese would fare baking for so long, but it was pretty well protected by the cornbread topping.

I would love to hear any ideas or suggestions you might have!