I’ve found a new awesome freezer meal, courtesy of Heavenly Homemakers and just had to share (my thoughts are in italics)! When I stumbled across this recipe I was a little doubtful. It calls for a basic white sauce using milk and my track record with such sauces has been so disastrous, that if I even mention a white sauce for dinner Dave cringes (that may be an exaggeration, but I’ve made some spectacular messes of white sauces). This one however is so easy that even I managed to pull it off. All three of us agreed that it was a winner and Ajax even ate the broccoli that was mixed in. I told him they were trees and that dinosaurs LOVE trees! He gobbled them up.
- 2 C cooked chicken, cut into bite sized pieces
- 2 1/2 C whole wheat pasta
- 3 C whole milk (I used 2% as that’s what we had)
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1/2 tsp sea salt
- I added in more seasonings- cumin, a little pepper, paprika, etc.
- 1/4 C grated parmesan cheese
- 4 ounces softened cream cheese (I added a little less than 4 ounces)
- Shredded cheese
- Green veggie
In a large cooking pot, combine cooked chicken, uncooked pasta, milk, and seasonings. Cook over medium-high heat, stirring constantly until the pasta is tender (the starch from the pasta will thicken the milk creating a creamy sauce). I left my sauce a tiny bit runny as I stuck this in the freezer and wanted to be sure if was liquidy enough when I cooked it. Note: at first your gonna think, this isn’t working I’m just stirring milk around a pot, but keep stirring, once the sauce starts thickening it’ll go fast and you want to be sure to stir stir stir or the bottom will burn… think 10 – 12 minutes or so.
Remove cooking pot from heat. Stir in parmesan cheese and cream cheese till mixed through. I also added in fresh, steamed broccoli, chopped. Pour pasta mixture into a casserole dish (9×13). Sprinkle a little cheese on top and bake in oven at 350 for about 15 minutes. Or, you can stop after adding it to the casserole dish, cover and freeze. To cook, just thaw and bake at 350 for about 30-40 min, or till heated through. I can’t wait to get a few of these into the freezer for my maternity leave.
I made two of these dishes. One I mixed the veggies through, but Dave isn’t a fan of broccoli, so for this one I just put it on top to one side and it was great.