The official name for this casserole is Jessica’s Favorite Green Chili Hominy, but since I remember it as the hominy casserole from Perini Ranch in Buffalo Gap, Texas, I call it Perini Ranch Green Chili Hominy.  This hominy casserole is seriously good and so easy to make.  It can be made in advance or even frozen.  The hominy casserole was served at the brunch for the Builders and Boomers, and several of the ladies asked for the recipe.  I think they were as taken by this hominy casserole as I am.  I promised I would share the recipe, and here it is.

The ingredients are simple – white hominy, bacon, cheddar cheese, poblano or Anaheim peppers, an onion, and pickled jalapeño juice (add some of the pickled jalapeños if you desire).  The recipe calls for 4 (15 ounce) cans of hominy, but I used 2 (1 pound 13 ounce) cans (58 ounces as opposed to 60 ounces), and it worked well.

Drain the hominy and reserve 1/2 cup of the hominy liquid.

Dice the bacon.  Skip this step if you want to fry the bacon and then chop it.

Grate the beautiful cheddar cheese.  You also need to dice the onions and peppers.  Now you are ready to start cooking.  Prep work is the hardest part of cooking.

Cook the diced bacon until done – brown and crisp.  You could fry the bacon strips and then dice the cooked bacon, but I find it easier to dice the bacon first and then cook it.  Either way you do it – we can still be friends.  After the bacon is nice and brown, remove it from the pan.  Pour off most of the bacon grease.

Next sauté the chopped onions in the reserved bacon grease.  Remove the onions from the pan.

If needed, add a little more of the bacon grease to the pan and sauté the chopped peppers.  The reason you have to do the peppers separately from the onions is that you use 1/2 of the peppers in the casserole and the other 1/2 of the peppers on top of the casserole.  Also, the recipe did not suggest sautéing the peppers, but I wanted to, so I did.  Hope that is not too confusing.

In a Dutch oven or large skillet, heat the hominy until throughly heated – stir often.  Add the hominy liquid and jalapeño juice and bring back to high temperature.

Add 3/4 of the grated cheese.  Cook and stir until the cheese is melted.

Next, stir in 1/2 of the bacon, 1/2 of the peppers and all of the onions into the hominy mixture.  An option is to add 2-3 pickled jalapeños (seeded and diced).  Add the jalapeños at this time if you want to used them.  I used about 2 tablespoons of the jalapeños, and the hominy was not too hot – it really depends on the jalapeños, so use them to your personal taste.

Pour the hominy mixture into a 9X13 pan.  Top the casserole with the rest of the bacon, peppers, and cheese.  At this point, you can refrigerate the casserole.  The directions mentioned freezing the casserole as an option.

Bake the casserole until the cheese melts and the casserole is throughly heated.  It only takes about 15 minutes if cooked immediately or 40 minutes if it has been in the refrigerator.

The hominy casserole is a great substitute for cheese grits, and it is delicious.  Enjoy!

Blessings to you and yours,

Go to lanabird.com for the printable recipe or click on the title of this post.  The print button is under the share button.