Tator Tot Casserole

Tator Tot Casserole

Monday was the 25th Birthday of my twin sons.  It's hard to believe that they are not toddlers anymore.  Seems like I just had them and now they are handsome young men, treating mom out to dinner on Sunday night because we share a birthday week.While we were at dinner they were both huddled over their phones at one point and suddenly they looked up, turned the phone around and asked, "Mom, do you know how to make this?"  The funniest part is, they both know that I do because they grew up eating it.  They were asking me about, none other than, Tator Tot Casserole. 

I originally had this planned for Wednesday night's dinner, because it's easy and I like it and it's my birthday, but as with any plan, they are made to be broken so I made this on Monday night instead and one of my sons joined us for dinner.

Since my husband is still out of town, I have been amassing quite a freezer collection of dinner items for him because I have been saving him a serving of each meal that I have been making.  I made this one a bit different than normal. 

I had a little over 2lbs of pre cooked ground meat, this was a mix of ground beef and ground turkey that I had prepared earlier this month and froze.  I thawed it somewhat in the microwave and broke it up into smaller pieces and mixed it together with the soups ( I used 3 cans of soup and 2 packs of the onion soup mix since I had extra meat), then put it in the bottom of the baking dish and added the cheese and tots. It wasn't until my mom was having it for lunch on Tuesday that she even thought to ask about the meat remembering that I had precooked the ground beef with the ground turkey.  After I affirmed that it was that meat, she decided that she was full and refused to eat the rest, lol. If I were to use extra meat in the future, I think I will stick to just the one pack of onion soup mix and this was a tad bit heavy on the salt, other than that it was delicious and my son had absolutely no complaints.

Tator Tot Casserole

This can be done in the crock pot or the oven, depending on how you want to prepare it..

2 lb ground beef, browned and drained
2 cans cream of potato soup (any "cream of" soup will work)
2 cups shredded cheddar cheese (we use mild)
1 package Lipton Onion Soup Mix
1 bag of frozen tator tots

To bake in the oven, preheat oven per the bag of tator tots.  Mix the Cream of soup and the Lipton Soup mix together, then layer the beef in the bottom of a casserole dish, spread the soup mix over the beef, top with the shredded cheese and then place the tator tots over this until it is completely covered.  Bake per the directions of the tator tots until the cheese in the center is melted. I usually cook it at 400 for 35 minutes and check the center.

If preparing in the crock pot, spray with non stick cooking spray (to make clean up easier).  Mix the "cream of" soup with the Lipton Onion Soup Mix.  For mushy tator tots, place them on the bottom of the crock pot, then cover with the meat followed by the soups, cook on low for 5-6 hours or high for 2-3 hours.  If you don't want the tots to be mushy, put them on top of the other ingredients, or even split them up evenly between the top and bottom (you may need to adjust cooking time for the ones on top).  Top with cheese when serving.

I personally prefer the oven.

Enjoy!