Chicken & Spinach Pasta Bake

This was the recipe on my menu for tonight and it turned our great, plus it was super easy. I found it on Pinterest and the link is here. I changed a few things like omitting the onion, olive oil, diced tomatoes and I added Top the Tater sour cream since it seemed to go well with the cream cheese. My son told me it's super yummy, so this turned out to be a keeper.

Ingredients:

• 8 oz uncooked rigatoni
• 1 (10 oz) package frozen spinach
• 3 cups cubed cooked chicken breast
• 1 (8 oz) container chive and onion cream cheese
• 3 Tablespoons Top the Tater sour cream
• 1-1/2 cup shredded Mozzarella and Provolone mix

Instructions:

• Prepare rigatoni and set aside.
• Cook and drain the chopped spinach, pressing it into a colander to remove all liquid.
• Cook the chicken breast.
• Combine chicken, spinach, cream cheese, sour cream and then add the rigatoni.
• Place in 9 x 13 baking dish and cover with the shredded cheese.
• Bake for 30 minutes in a 375 degree oven.

Enjoy!

Thank you for visiting :o)

Chicken and Sweet Potato Chowder

  

I signed up on the Land-O-Lakes website and found a great recipe. I have been looking for some good fall recipes, and this was a great one. We have a Soup Swap at my church's mom's group next month, and I decided I'll be making this one! The whole family loved it, including my often finicky toddler son.

Ingredients:

• 2 T butter
• 1 cup chopped celery
• 2 sweet potatoes, peeled and cut
• 1 to 2 cans of chicken broth
• 1 T minced garlic
• 1 t thyme
• 2 cups cubed cooked chicken
• 1/2 t paprika
• 1 cup Half & Half
• 2 T flour

Instructions:

• Melt butter in pan and add garlic and celery. Cook until tender.
• Add sweet potatoes, chicken broth, garlic and thyme leaves. Cook until mixture boils and potatoes are tender (10 to 15 minutes).
• Stir in chicken and paprika.
• In small bowl, combine half and half with flour until smooth. Gradually add mixture to pan stirring constantly until mixture comes to a boil and is thickened (6 to 8 minutes).

Serve and enjoy! We had ours with oyster crackers.

Thanks for visiting!

Chicken Cacciatore

Well, too late I realized the recipe I printed out from My Menu Plan this week was supposed to be cooked in a slow cooker. Oops! So I had to improvise and created the recipe below, using some basics from the original recipe. I liked how it turned out! Very flavorful and my son just loved it. Definitely a keeper!

INGREDIENTS:

1-2 pounds chicken breast, cubed

1 can diced tomatoes

1 can tomato paste

1/2 cup chicken broth

1 red pepper, diced

1-2 carrots, diced

1 T minced garlic

Italian seasonings to taste

1 cup rice, cooked

INSTRUCTIONS:

• Cook chicken in 1 tablespoon olive oil until no pink is left.
• Add red pepper, diced tomatoes, tomato paste, carrots, chicken broth and Italian seasoning. Stir ingredients together.
• Cook on low to medium heat until carrots and red pepper are tender (20 minutes or so).
• Serve over cooked rice.

ENJOY!

Thanks for visiting!

My Menu Plan 10/3/11

I really enjoy cooking and trying new recipes. One thing I look for are meals that have all the ingredients in one dish. That way, the meat, pasta/potato and vegetable are all together! I love meals like that. Here is what I plan on making this week. I'm still trying to use up the ingredients in my pantry and now working on our freezer.

Click here to see what others are making this week!

Monday
Beef Stroganoff over Noodles with Peas

Tuesday
Easy Chicken Cacciatore with Corn (Recipe is from Parents.com)

Wednesday
Spaghetti with Garlic Bread

Thursday
Chicken Divan Casserole

Friday
Hamburger Cabbage Soup an Amish recipe

Saturday
Possible date night - Out to Eat!

Sunday
Always my night off!

I am also linking up to Serve It Up Sunday:

Thanks for visiting!

Chicken Tetrazzini

This was a recipe I linked to in my Menu Plan Monday. It was so good that I wanted to share it in full here! The only change I made was to add broccoli, which seemed to go really well with it. It was also a big help in my "eating through the pantry" project with the 3 different kinds of soup, the chicken broth and then the pasta. Plus, it was easy to make too.



Ingredients:
1 box regular or thin spaghetti
3/4 cup chicken broth
4-6 cups chopped, cooked chicken (4-6 chicken breasts)
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 can cream of celery soup
1 can cream of chicken soup
1-1/2 cups sour cream
1 box sliced mushrooms
1 bag frozen cut broccoli
1 cup Parmesan cheese
1/4 t pepper
1/2 t salt
Shredded cheddar to top


Instructions:

• Cook pasta according to directions. Once done, pour back into pot and add chicken broth. Let sit.
• Stir together the cooked chicken with soups, salt, pepper, sour cream, Parmesan cheese , mushrooms and broccoli.
• Add pasta and mix well together.
• Place in 9x13 pan and sprinkle with the shredded cheddar.
  
• Bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until cheese is melted and sides are bubbly.
• This makes enough for two 9x13 dishes, so split in half. I cooked one, and put the other half in a gallon Ziploc bag which will go in my freezer.

Enjoy!!

Sweet Potato Tray-Baked Chicken

I saw a picture of this in the Parade Magazine and it really caught my eye. I love meals that include lots of cooked vegetables and the star of this one is the sweet potato. I know how good sweet potatoes are for you, but so far this is the first recipe I have that uses them. This turned out to be a huge hit. J really liked it and it made plenty for leftovers too. This starts out with a brine that the chicken breasts will soak in (2-8 hours), so you have to do a little pre-planning for the time factor involved there. The only ingredient I omitted was the bacon. Partly I forgot, but then realized we didn't need it. Oh, I guess I nixed the onion too since it doesn't agree with my husband.


Brine Ingredients:
1 quart water
2 T salt (calls for kosher but I used sea salt)
1/3 cup honey
3 T minced garlic
1 T sage
1/4 cup apple-cider vinegar
Juice of 1 lemon


"Bake" Ingredients:
4 boneless chicken breasts
3 sweet potatoes (scrubbed and thinly sliced)
4 medium potatoes (scrubbed and thinly sliced)
4 T minced garlic
2 T sage (shredded leaves if possible; I had to use ground sage)
Olive Oil (I used our oil sprayer and liberally sprayed it over the vegetables before baking)
Sea salt and pepper
1-2/3 cups chicken broth
2/3 cup half and half
1 cup grated Parmesan cheese
A few pats of butter


































Instructions:

• Mix the brine in a large bowl. Add the chicken and cover with cling wrap. Refrigerate for 2 to 8 hours. (I did mine for about 6 hours.)
  
• Remove chicken and allow it to come to room temperature. Drain chicken and discard brine. Pat dry with paper towels and set aside.
  
• Toss potatoes, garlic and sage with olive oil and a pinch of salt/pepper. Place in large roasting pan and pour in broth. Cook for 30 minutes. **Note to self: Don't forget to add the broth at this point next time. I forgot and ended up adding it in the next part. It didn't seem to be that big of a deal though.**
  
• Remove pan from oven. Pour in cream and sprinkle with pepper and Parmesan. Add the chicken breasts placing pats of butter on each piece. Cook for 35 minutes or until chicken is golden brown.

ENJOY!

For more recipe ideas click below:

Quick Chicken with Saffron Rice Meal

I do a weekly menu every week which makes meal time so much easier. Sometimes though I veer off my menu (like today) and try to find something quick and simple to cook. Very low-maintenance. I was supposed to make Pork Goulash in the slow cooker, but totally forgot to get it going 4 hours ago .... hence the need for something quick and easy since it's 5pm. I found (saffron) Yellow Rice at our grocery store as I'd had a hankering to try saffron rice after having it with a dish at a restaurant downtown. This particular brand has dehydrated vegetables too, which I like. It is called Vigo Saffron Yellow Rice.


Ingredients:
1 pkg yellow saffron rice
1 lb boneless chicken breasts
1 T olive oil
1 T minced garlic
1 pkg peas
1 T turmeric (optional)


Easy Instructions:
For tonight's dish, I just prepared the yellow rice according to the package directions. While that was cooking, I took about a pound of frozen chicken breasts and threw them in a pot of water to boil for about 1/2 hour. To the water, I added the olive oil and minced garlic to flavor the chicken. Once the rice and chicken were done, I cut the chicken up and added it to the rice. Then I cooked the peas and added them too. Since I just bought turmeric from the Indian grocery store, I added about 1 T of that too. Because it was a little dry, I poured in a few splashes of milk and dinner was served!

Sweet, Sticky, Spicy Chicken

I saw this recipe on a blog I visit called Live, Laugh and Love. I am including a link to the recipe on her website, and also writing it out below. Visit Julia at Live, Laugh and Love.

So I have found really tasty chicken like this at Chinese restaurants, but I never looked for a recipe to make myself. I love this combination of ingredients for the sauce with the brown sugar, soy sauce and garlic especially. This is a keeper! So when I made this, the sauce never actually thickened so I took 1 tablespoon of cornstarch mixed with a little water and then mixed that into the sauce. After a few minutes, it thickened up quite nicely. This was really yummy and reminded my husband and I of some of the great chicken dishes we've had at our favorite Chinese restaurants.

Ingredients:
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1/4 cup honey
1/2 cup soy sauce
1 tablespoon garlic (chopped or crushed)
3 tablespoons hot sauce
1-2 pounds chicken breasts or strips (I used chicken breasts)

*optional: Add 1/2 to 1 tablespoon corn starch with water to the sauce if it doesn't thicken



Instructions:

• Mix all the ingredients together in a mixing bowl.
• Brown the chicken on both sides.
• Pour the sauce over the chicken.
• Simmer, uncovered until the sauce thickens (about 10 minutes).

We made ours with rice and broccoli but my husband thought it would be great with pea pods added too. Enjoy!

Tasty Roast Chicken Vegetable Soup

I recently picked up a whole chicken that we had a few meals from. It was time to figure out what to do with the carcass. I did a google search, and after investigating several I finally found what I was looking for at The Boston Globe.

When you click the link, you'll see the entire recipe. There is a recipe for the broth and there is a recipe for the vegetables that later get mixed in with the broth.

Here were my personal additions:
BROTH:

• I added about 2 tablespoons of olive oil for flavor.
• I added about 1 tablespoon of crushed garlic, also for flavor.
• I added various spices (some parsley, some Spike seasoning and some McCormick Garlic Herb chicken seasoning - maybe 1 teaspoon each.)

VEGETABLES:

• Instead of button mushrooms I just used pre-sliced white mushrooms.
• I also added about 7 or 8 small (cut up) red potatoes I pre-cooked in the microwave for 6 minutes.
• I added about 1 cup of egg noodles.

Hope you enjoy it! Another cold-day comfy meal.

Chicken Spaghetti

This is a recipe I got out of the Wisconsin State Journal and decided to try it. The picture isn't mine but this is almost exactly what it looked like when done (except for the red pimentos). My family likes spaghetti and I thought this would be a nice new twist. It turns out it was a real hit! My son is in a season of being a very picky eater and I watched him gobble this down. He finished it all and asked for seconds! I can't remember the last time he's done that. He usually has 3 bites and says "all done mommy". So this will be a keeper.

Ingredients:
*Spaghetti noodles (amount would depend on # of people eating)
*2 cans condensed cream of mushroom soup
*2 cups shredded sharp cheddar cheese
*1 small onion, finely diced
*1/4 cup finely diced green bell pepper
*Seasoned salt to taste
*Black pepper to taste
*1/8 tsp cayenne pepper (this gives it a nice kick)
*About 3 cups cut up and cooked chicken breast

Heat oven to 350 degrees. Cook spaghetti according to directions, drain but KEEP 1/2 cup pasta water and set aside. In a large bowl, combine cooked spaghetti, soup and 1-1/2 cups of the shredded cheese. Stir in onion, bell pepper and cayenne pepper (I actually threw my onion and green pepper in with my chicken to cook it a bit before mixing). Mix well. Add chicken and some of the reserved pasta water (as needed) and mix. Spoon into a 9 x 13 baking dish coated with cooking spray. Top with remaining cheese. Bake for 35 to 45 minutes or until bubbly. Let stand 5 minutes and serve. Hope you enjoy it!

Picture credit: Kids Eat the Darndest Things

Chicken Broccoli Rice Casserole

My husband got this recipe from a lady at work who was really thoughtful after I had our baby and wasn't able to cook much. After sitting around for a couple years, I finally made it! It was pretty good too and so easy to make. Here are the details....

Ingredients:
Cut up cooked chicken (1 to 2 pounds)
1 large jar cheese whiz
1 can cream of mushroom soup
2 packages frozen broccoli
1 small diced onion
1-2 cups of rice

Cook broccoli as on package directions. Cook rice. Mix all the ingredients together. Put in a casserole dish and bake at 350 for 45 minutes. Enjoy!

Baked Ziti; 3 cheese with chicken

This dish is kind of like macaroni and cheese with chicken but with ziti instead of macaroni. I like the white cheeses in it too.

Ingredients:
1 (16oz) package ziti pasta
1 lb boneless chicken breasts
1 jar Alfredo sauce
1 (8 oz) sour cream
1 (15 oz) ricotta cheese
2 large eggs, slightly beaten
1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1/4 cup parsley
1 1/2 cup mozzarella

Cut up chicken breasts and cook in pan. Cook ziti. Drain and mix chicken, ziti, alfredo and sour cream. Spoon HALF of the pasta/chicken mixture into a 9 x 13 dish. Stir ricotta and next three ingredients; spread over ziti. Spoon remaining ziti over ricotta mixture and then sprinkle the top with mozzarella. Bake at 350 for 30 minutes or until golden brown crust. Enjoy!

Chicken Primavera Pie

Lately I've been making a lot of Bisquick recipes. They are fairly easy and something different for a change. This is one of my favorites.

Ingredients

• 1-1/2 cups cooked chicken
• 1 (10 oz) package of frozen asparagus cuts, thawed & well-drained
• 1 cup frozen mix, bell peppers & onions, thawed & well-drained
• 1/3 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 1/2 cup Bisquick
• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 eggs

• Heat oven to 400. Grease 9-inch pie plate. Layer chicken, asparagus, bell peppers/onions and cheese in pie plate. Stir remaining ingredients until blended. Pour into pie plate. Bake 30-35 minutes or until knife in center comes out clean. Let stand 5 minutes before serving.