Chicken Surprise Casserole

My sweet friend Annamarie brought this meal to us right after we had our son and it was so yummy. We have made it many times since because it is delicious! Our kids love it too. To make it easier on me I cook the chicken in butter and onions in the crockpot in the morning and then combine the ingredients whenever David is napping. Then around 4 I pop it in the oven. Super easy and really delicious! Thank you Annamarie!

Chicken Surprise Casserole
7 or 8 chicken breast halves (I have gotten away with only using 4)
1 box butter crackers crushed (about 2-3 sleeves Townhouse)
1 stick melted butter
1 can cream of chicken
1 can cream of celery
1 can water chestnuts, chopped
1 onion, chopped
16 oz sour cream
3/4 cup chopped celery

Cook chicken and shred. Saute onions in a bit of butter. Combine crushed crackers with melted butter, reserve 1 cup for topping. Pat remaining cracker crumbs into 13x9 baking dish. Combine chicken, soups, water chestnuts, onion, sourcream and celery and spread evenly over crust. Sprinkle reserved crumbs over top. Cover and bake for 30 mins at 350. Uncover and bake 5-10 mins longer. Eat alone, or serve with noodles.

Mac and Cheese

I may or may not be baking this as we speak. Don't judge I am pregnant and a sandwich just wasn't going to cut it for lunch today. This recipe originally came from Rachael Ray. We discovered it 4 years ago and have been making it ever since. Check out the full original recipe here.

Mac and Cheese
1 pound pasta
Salt and black pepper
onion & garlic powder or salt
3 tablespoons butter
3 tablespoons flour
3 cups milk
3 cups cheese, grated

Preheat oven to 400. Cook pasta to just shy of al dente. While pasta is cooking start your sauce. Add butter to sauce pan until melted, add flour and cook for about a minute. Whisk in milk and season with seasoning, bring to a bubble. Once to a bubble turn off stove top and stir in cheese until melted. Once pasta is done combine the pasta and the sauce. Pour into baking dish and bake until bubbly and golden brown.

This has become a favorite recipe at our house. We love to make different variations. You can add whatever you want to it and you can use different cheeses to make more of a 3 cheese pasta or whatever kind you like. One of our favorites is using Parmesan cheese, then blending up spinach into it. We also love to add broccoli to ours. You can also add breadcrumbs or corn flakes to the top. The kids love this and so does my husband. Enjoy :)

Creamy Vegetable Casserole

1 package of frozen vegetable blend (we used Mediterranean blend)
Cooked chicken
2 cans cream of chicken soup
1 can milk (fill one of the empty cream of chicken soup cans with milk)
2 heaping spoonfuls cream cheese
onion salt to taste
cheese

Blend soup, milk, cream cheese and salt together until smooth. Add veggies and chicken, mix. Pour into greased baking dish. Sprinkle cheese over top. Put aluminum foil over dish. Place in oven and bake on 350 for about a half an hour. Take foil off, mix cheese in and then sprinkle more cheese on top. Broil for 5 mins. Serve over cooked rice. 

Penne Florentine

We thought of this recipe while making our Chicken Pizza last week. We hope you enjoy it!

Pasta Mixture:
1 package penne noodles- cooked to al dente
1 chopped tomato
1/2 - 1 cup chopped spinach
chopped cooked chicken (however much you want)

Toss together. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

Sauce:
2 T butter
1 T - 2 T flour
1 c milk
1/2 c - 1 c Parmesan cheese
1 can cream of chicken soup

Melt butter in sauce pan, add flour to butter. Cook until bubbly. Add 1/2 c milk and cook again until bubbly. Turn stove off and parm cheese. Mix until smooth. Add cream of chicken soup and 1/2 milk. Mix again until smooth.

Combine sauce and pasta mix.

Put in buttered casserole dish, sprinkle cheese over top. Bake until brown and bubbly.

We didn't have extra cheese for on top, so ours isn't very brown on top, but it was really bubbly

We were lazy tonight, but normally we would serve it along side broccoli and bread sticks or garlic bread. Enjoy! It is so delicious and your kids will love it too!

Little Thomas was very happy with dinner tonight

Tatertot Casserole

1 bag of tatertots
1 lb ground beef
1 package of ranch dressing powder
1 can green beans
1 can corn
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 can cream of chicken soup

Cook ground beef, drain and add ranch powder. In a bowl mix together the cream of mushroom + cream of chicken with 1 can of milk (just fill up one of the soap cans with the milk you have in the fridge). Mix until smooth. (I used my hand blender to make ours smooth). In separate bowl mix together the corn, beans and beef. Add 3/4 of the soup mix. Pour mixture into greased casserole dish. Next top the mixture with tatertots in whatever way you want. I like to just dump the bag out and spread them as evenly as possible, but Thomas likes to put them in perfect rows.

Pour the remaining soup over, and top with grated cheese.

Cook at 350 for about 30 mins or until tatertots are done and casserole is brown and bubbly.

Enjoy!! Your kids will LOVE this- I know ours do.

Lazy Lasagna

Way back in 2008 I was rooming with my dear friend Erika. She introduced me to baked ziti and I fell in love. Since then I have been making my own versions of it (okay they are not that much different, just with penne instead of ziti usually). Here is the recipe for it. I am going to call if lazy lasagna, because that is the first thing that popped into my head.

1 lb ground beef
spaghetti sauce (1 jar or some homemade, whichever you prefer)
1 box noodles (penne, ziti, etc)
1 16 oz container cottage cheese
1 handful shredded cheddar cheese

Cook the ground beef. Then add the spaghetti sauce.

While the beef is cooking you will be cooking the noodles

 After the noodles are done add them to the sauce, mix well, then add the cottage cheese. Blend all 3 ingredients together.

Poor that into a casserole dish, top with cheese and cover.

Bake at 350 for 30 - 40 minutes. Uncover for the last 5 - 10 minutes.

Enjoy! I like to serve mine with corn and break sticks.