Chicken Veggie Casserole

Personal Observations: This tastes like potpie! No crust needed! Easy & inexpensive, I make this one often.

Gidget's Rating: 5 stars

Sausage Tomato Hashbrown Casserole

Personal Observations: One of my favorites! I have yet to figure out how best to get the tomato flavor into the whole dish. The original recipe called for cherry tomatoes, but those are rather pricey so I substituted sliced tomatoes. I'm considering using diced tomotoes next time and mixing it into the dish rather than layering it on top...*ponders* We'll see.



Gidget's Rating: 5 stars

Hearty Chicken Casserole

Personal Observations: This was a tasty dish. It's more labor intensive than I would have liked as it took a LONG time to get the sauce to thicken (might be attributed to my saucepans though). I liked it enough to keep the recipe but don't know how often I'll make it!

Gidget's Rating: 4 stars

Cheese-Topped Beef Bake

Personal Observations: Not all pasta is equal. This is an important lesson. I couldn't find medium shell pasta at my local grocery store, so I substituted a tube pasta no realizing that the resulting quantity of pasta could fill two of those 13x9x2 baking dishes. That's a lot of pasta.... So, be careful when substituting. Otherwise this was pretty tasty -- more fat than I want to know about, but tasty.

Gidget's Rating: 4 stars

Ground Beef Potpie

Personal Observations: This still needs some tweaking. I used a box of instant mashed potatoe flakes as a substitute for the mashed potatoes and increased the beef broth to a full can (14 oz?). It turned out okay although it was rather...thick. :) I also need to buy some marjoram! Also, I think we can dispense with the pie pastry sheet since it tastes funny when it's not homemade. I didn't really add much to the dish anyway and the potatoes & carrot are enough carbs to balance the protein.

Gidget's Rating: 4 stars

Chicken Noodle Casserole

Personal Observations:

This is really good if you like cheesy sauces without it being too thick. The aroma was so tantalizing that I couldn't wait until the noodles had cooked to try out the chicken mixture. You can guess what happened -- it never made it to the baking stage. Definitely prime deee-lish factor here. My only wrinkle in the process was not being able to find savory.

Gidget's Rating: 5 stars, even without the savory!

Turkey Enchilada Casserole

Pretty darn good, but don't eat it if you have a stomach ulcer or a sensitive stomach.

Ingredients:
1 lb. lean ground turkey
1 medium green pepper, chopped
1 medium onion, chopped
3 garlic cloves, minced
2 cans (15 oz each) black beans, rinsed and drained
1 jar (16 oz) salsa
1 can (15 oz) tomato sauce
1 can (14.5 oz) Mexican stewed tomatoes
1 t. each: onion powder, garlic powder, and ground cumin.
12 corn tortillas (6 inches)
2 c. (8 oz) shredded cheddar cheese, divided

In a large nonstick saucepan coated with nonstick cooking spray**, cook turkey, green pepper, onion and garlic over medium heat until meat is no longer pink. Stir in the beans, salsa, tomato sauce, tomatoes, and spices. Bring to a boil. Reduce heat; simmer, uncovered, for 10 min.

Spread 1 c. meat sauce into a 13x9x2-inch baking dish coated with nonstick cooking spray. Top with six tortillas. Spreak with half of remaining meat sauce; sprinkle with 1 c. cheese. Layer with remaining tortillas and meat sauce.

Cover and bake at 350 degrees F for 20 min. Uncover; sprinkle with remaining cheese. Bake 5-10 min. longer or until bubbly and cheese is melted.

Personal Observations: Do not substitute flour tortillas. I can attest that they turn gooey in the casserole. Not a fan of corn tortillas, I think next time I'll leave out the tortillas and mix in corn chips AFTER baking.

**I opt to use olive oil in these situations.

Gidget's Rating: 4 stars.