Meatless (TVP) mexican

I have had a bag of TVP (textured vegetable protein) in my pantry for probably a year now. I don't even remember why I bought it. I think I was going to try a meatless meatloaf recipe, and then the thing was so convoluted that I abandoned the idea. So, now... what to do with my bag of TVP?

The good thing about TVP is that it just doesn't go bad. It's like rice. You could take it out of a time capsule and eat the stuff. The bad thing about TVP is that it has absolutely no flavor, and you better be making something with some "oomph" to it, if you're using it.

Hmm. Oomph. To me, a food that always has a flavorful kick is anything mexican. So, I plugged some search words into Google and found this recipe. Of course, as usual, I modified it.

Ingredients:

1 cup TVP (textured vegetable protein)

1 can of diced tomatoes with chiles

1 can of black beans

1 can of vegetarian refried beans

1 cup water plus 1 TBSP Better Than Bouillon No Beef Base (or 1 cup beef broth if you eat meat)

1/2 packet of taco seasoning

Directions:

Take your stick blender and blend up those tomatoes and chiles. Then, throw everything into your crockpot together and stir it until the TVP is wet and distributed throughout the mixture.

Let it cook for 3-4 hours. If you have a crockpot like mine (metal), you can speed up the cooking time and the TVP cooks just fine.

The best part of this recipe is its versatility. I decided that I wanted to eat it on a salad. My husband, a meat-loving carnivore, put his into a tortilla and made a burrito. After he inhaled it, he said that he couldn't even tell that there wasn't a meat in it.

Make it a taco filling. Use it in a burrito. Throw it with some rice. Or, make a mexican salad and crunch some tortilla chips on it for good measure.

Ole´!