Rachel Donaldson.

Welcome to Dining with Donaldson, the place where I try recipes so you don’t have to!

Believe it or not, the school year is just around the corner! Last week, I shared some of my favorite tips and tricks for successful freezer meal prep. Now it’s time to put those tips to work and start filling that freezer!

I wanted to kick off the recipes with a dinner favorite, and I thought what better way to do so than by sharing one of my daughter Adalynn’s absolute favorites. In fact, she usually requests it for her birthday meal. I have been making this recipe for so long that I can’t even remember the original recipe or where it came from. This twist on a traditional favorite is simply called Chicken & Stuffing, at least at our house. Whenever that is written on our weekly meal board, everyone gets excited.

I bet you can guess the two main ingredients already. If you said chicken and stuffing, you are so right! The nice thing about this dish is that you can make it ahead as a freezer meal or throw it together quickly on the spot. Since I have been making it for so long, I have also come up with a few helpful shortcuts along the way.

The entirety of this dish is just five ingredients: chicken, cream of chicken soup, sliced cheese, boxed stuffing, and butter. The simplicity of the dish also means you can customize it however you want. I have used cream of mushroom, cream of onion, cream of celery, and even cream of potato! Just keep in mind that changing your “cream of” soup will change the flavor slightly. And now that I am typing this out, I think I might have to try cream of broccoli next.

Another easy customization is the sliced cheese. I’m sure you will be shocked to know that I have tried all kinds of combinations. I usually reach for pepper jack or Swiss because they both add another layer of flavor, but you can really use whatever you have on hand. If you want a few flavor combinations to try, I would suggest cream of chicken with pepper jack or cream of mushroom with Swiss. Really, the possibilities are endless!

As you can see, I have intentionally left the ingredients vague in the recipe provided, but don’t let that scare you. Feel free to use any of the combinations I mentioned or come up with your own. I also love using foil pans in my kitchen. You can buy them in bulk online, and they mean fewer dishes after dinner, not to mention I don’t have any of my regular pans tied up in the freezer waiting for me.

Another way to get this dish to your dinner table even faster is to use precooked chicken. This could be chicken you cooked ahead of time and threw in the freezer for a rainy day, leftovers from another night, or even a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store. Say it with me now, the possibilities are endless!

CHICKEN & STUFFING

-Prep Time: 5 minutes

-Cook Time: 30-40 minutes

-Serves: 4

INGREDIENTS: 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts-butterflied; 1 can cream of soup; 4 slices cheese; 1 box stuffing; 2 T butter-melted

DIRECTIONS

1-Spray a square foil pan with cooking oil

2-Place butterflied chicken breasts in bottom of pan

3-Top with sliced cheese, spreading them out to cover as much surface as possible

4-Top with cream of soup

5-Season with your preference (I do a combination of salt, pepper, garlic powder and onion powder

6-Cover with a layer of plastic wrap

7-Cover the plastic wrap with a layer of foil

8-Using a Sharpie, write the date, meal and heating instructions on the foil

TO BAKE

Thaw out in the fridge (overnight if possible); preheat oven to 350 degrees; remove plastic wrap and reapply foil; bake for 30 minutes; remove from oven; remove foil; sprinkle box stuffing on top of casserole; carefully pour melted butter on top of stuffing; return to oven until chicken is completely cooked and stuffing is browned.

Rachel Donaldson is an author, self-described foodie and the current family and consumer sciences teacher at North Tama Community School District. She resides with her family in Vinton.