Easy chicken casseroles

 

No, don’t yawn just because I mentioned casseroles. Those venerable reminders of the 1950s dinner table are among my favorite foods. But I am increasingly in the minority. Last night I fixed the entrée for a potluck with three friends. When I said I’d do a chicken casserole, one, watching her carbs, replied, “I don’t mind a casserole as long as there is a salad too.” It was sort of a left-handed compliment, but her thinking was that casseroles are usually heavy with pasta. She was pleasantly surprised last night.

So I thought I’d share two of my favorite chicken casseroles, sans pasta. A caution about chicken: somehow, I have lost the ability to poach or steam chicken so that it is tender. (After I made coq au vin with chewy chicken, Christian said he’d pound and velvet it for me next time.) For these casseroles and a lot of other dishes, I rely on rotisserie chickens. The catch with those ready-to-use birds is that they are often really high in sodium. Locally, I think Central Market chickens have the lowest amount. Since everything from soy sauce to canned soups is available in low-sodium form, you’d think they’d get around to roasting low-sodium chickens. Another hint: it’s much easier to bone a rotisserie chicken when you first get it home and it’s still hot. The meat slides off the bone. If you stick it in the fridge to bone later, it’s a whole different, difficult, and messy chore. (Jordan debones for me as soon as she gets home with groceries.) I usually have one or two deboned chickens in my freezer, ready to use. One chicken  yields about 2 cups of meat. A few stores offer breasts only, which I prefer. More meat for your buck.

Baked chicken salad casserole

2 cups chopped chicken

3 hard-boiled eggs, grated or sliced (I chopped them)

1-1/2 cups minced celery (do string your celery first)

2 cans cream of mushroom soup

4 tsp. finely minced onion (I used green onions)

½ cup mayonnaise

Juice of one lemon

1 tsp. salt

½ tsp. pepper

Crushed potato chips

Once you get everything chopped, this is a breeze to make. Layer the chicken, celery and eggs in a lightly greased casserole dish (I used 4 x 6 or thereabouts—I think 9 x 13 is too big). Mix remaining ingredients and pour over meat mixture. Top with crushed potato chips and bake at 350^o for 20-30 minutes. Watch that the potato chips don’t burn.

Curried chicken salad casserole

For this you need to plan ahead, and you need a fridge-to-oven dish. If you have some valuable old Corningware, it’s perfect. This is a cold dish—salad really—with a hot topping.

3 c. cooked chicken

2 cups sliced or diced celery

2 tsp. curry powder

1 tsp. lemon juice

¾ cups mayonnaise

½ cup sour cream

2 cups crushed potato chips

1 cup sharp cheddar cheese, grated.

           Mix everything together except the cheese and chips. Refrigerate overnight. Just before serving, top the casserole with potato chips and cheese mixed. Run it under the broiler just long enough to melt the cheese. Again, watch carefully—the topping scorches easily.

It strikes me that there is one basic sauce for chicken that you can vary slightly and make several dishes. It involves cream of mushroom soup (I’m not at all shy about admitting I love to cook with canned soups), mayonnaise, and sour cream. The other night I made white coq au vin and realized it was much the same as these two recipes but with wine. And lemon juice is often the distinguishing touch.