Ok so, let me tell you about my little adventure with this recipe (If you don’t want to know the story, scroll down to ingredients and get started). I got the idea from a FB friend who posted a pic of their dinner one night, THAT along with a recent segment on Rachael Ray. IN this segment (if you want to check it out it was on her Trash to Treasure episode) She had a restaurant owner who said “food it so expensive to not use up as much as you can of it”. He would take leftover bits and turn them into signature dishes, and ONE that stood out to me was an Au Gratin that he made with Potato Peels. SO I took the two ideas and SHA SHA! Chicken Au Gratin Bake! Ok, no, it wasn't that smooth. I made it there Friday night, and it was good, but not the consistency I was looking for...SO I made it again and nailed it. THIS also confirms that it's an affordable recipe, I made it twice! So here's your ingredients WITH measurements this time:
1 lb Boneless skinless Chicken breasts
2 cups potato skins OR Potatoes cut with a peeler
1 pk frozen spinach (or sub in your fave frozen veg)
2 Cans Cream of Mushroom Soup
Milk (Half a can)
1/2 an Onion
1 cup (Or more) Shredded Cheese
First thing is first, after you have your potatoes set, make sure you leave them in water up until you're ready to use them, or they'll turn brown (if they start to turn brown they'll actually change back when you get them into the water). ALSO the way I'm going to instruct this you'll find the potatoes are still a little crunchy. If that doesn't work for you, boil them a LITTLE bit before hand, just be careful not to do it TOO much because you're not going to mashed potatoes here (OR you actually COULD do mashed potatoes, that might be kind of cool with this recipe).
Pre heat the oven to about 350
Grease a casserole dish, and lay out the potatoes to line the bottom of the dish
Cube up the chicken and lay it out OVER the potatoes
Drain the spinach WELL . As a Rachael Ray fan I know SHE Instructs to wring it out in a clean kitchen towel the PROBLEM there is it will make your Kitchen towel NASTY. SO what I do is I put the spinach in my Strainer and put paper towel OVER the Spinach and kind of knead it into the spinach (not mixing in). It will squeeze the water out the bottom AND you'll absorb some through the top (this could take a bit of paper towel but will save your kitchen towels). After you've drained it spread it out over the chicken and Potatoes (It should spread fairly easily now that it's well drained)
In a large bowl mix together the soup, and Milk. Chop up the onion and add it to the soup. I add onion because one of the BIG influences on my cooking growing up, and still today, is my Nanny. This woman could seriously cook up some onion and eat it as a snack...BUT she has always said that Onion adds A LOT of flavor to a dish, and I found it to be true.
Pour the soup mixture over the rest of the stuff in the casserole dish. Bake for about 20 min, or until soup has thickened well.
Top the mixture with your cheese (this is why I said or more, if you want it CRAZY cheesy). Crank the oven up to broiler and let the cheese melt/brown, about 5-10 min (keep an eye on it).
and TA DA! You gots supper!
Serves 6
Total cost of the recipe=5.93 (Not including milk)
Cost per serving= .99 cents...YEAH!
So yeah there you have it. I'm SERIOUSLY trying to not do a bake next week, but we'll see! I DO have a recipe in my head, and it's seriously my FAVORITE meal ever, and it doesn't cost much really to create, but it's following the similar formula we've got going here thus far, so I MAY wait on that one (but it will SO be coming eventually).
Also if you ever read this and are all, she's got some weird dialog going on here for a recipe. WHY? Because legit when I'm typing I'm pretending that I'm hosting my cooking TV show...don't act like you've NEVER done it in your kitchen!
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