This one's Tried and True: Creamy Beef and Bean Enchiladas

I made a goal to type up all the recipes in my file folder called "Recipes, Tried and True." It was a good goal,  I thought, especially since I'd bought a nifty cookbook software to type them into. So I started going through the file and discovered that the label was a lie. Many so-called tried and trues had not been tried at all. And others, though they'd been tested once, couldn't really be called "true." So I made another goal. Go through all the recipes in this folder and determine whether they belong, whether they deserve to be passed onto posterity. Because that's really the reason for this exercise. One day, my children (read daughters) will decide they like to cook and will want to make all those favorites from childhood. If, then, their mother is able to attain her goal, they will have a  beautiful cookbook in which to find them.
Here's a recipe from the folder. This one had been tried several times, but wasn't very true because the quantities and directions were imprecise. I couldn't type it into my cookbook software as it was written. So I made it for dinner, taking note of all the changes. It's been so heavily adapted it hardly resembles the original. It's tasty, though, creamy and spicy at once. Definitely belongs in the cookbook.

Creamy Beef and Bean Enchiladas

Servings 10

Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 20-25

Heavily adapted from a recipe by Mama Maria's Tortillas

1 pound ground beef

1 tablespoon dried minced onion

1 (15-ounce) can beans, black or pinto, drained

3 ounces light cream cheese

1 (16-ounce) jar salsa, divided use

1 1/4 cups shredded cheese

10-12 wheat flour tortillas

3/4 cup light sour cream

Yield: 10-12 enchiladas

Brown ground beef with dried onion. Drain. Add beans, 1 cup of the salsa and the cream cheese. Heat and stir on medium until the mixture is hot and the cream cheese has melted. Add 3/4 cup shredded cheese. Mix well. Remove from heat. Spoon mixture into tortillas and roll up. Place in lightly greased, 9 X 13-inch casserole dish. Stir together remaining 1 cup of salsa and the sour cream. Spread over the top of the enchiladas. Sprinkle with remaining 1/2 cup shredded cheese. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes or until hot and bubbly and cheese has melted. To serve, garnish with additional sour cream, salsa and/or chopped olives, if desired.