Between 5 and 6pm in my house is truly the witching hour. Hannah is hungry. Jacob needs his rice cereal, his bath, and bed. I'm trying to cook dinner while dealing with the afore-mentioned chaos, and Scott is "on the way home". Needless to say, I've decided that this hour requires some careful planning in order for everyone to survive it. And most of the careful planning revolves around food. Ah, the age-old query: What's for dinner? I need to be able to make something simple, yet wholesome and filling. It can't require a lot of attention or prep work because I'm too busy keeping Hannah occupied (who is by this point in the day both hungry and tired), dealing with Jacob (see third sentence above), and we all know I'm not the strongest cook. So, in an effort to assuage the stress of this unholy hour, I've tried several new dinner options. Most are in the form of a casserole - one-dish meals that ostensibly can be prepared in advance and then simply placed in the oven to appear like magic just when we're all ready to eat.
Enter the lies. These recipes all come with approximate prep time and cook times. The cook times are accurate. The prep times? Who comes up with these? They must be meant for teams of experienced chefs all working in tandem, at high speed, with assistants to hand them things so they don't waste a precious second say, opening a drawer to get a knife. I see prep time 15 min. and think, "Okay, I'll start this at 4:30, relax for a bit, pop it in the oven at 5:00 and we can eat at 6:00". Beautiful. Except that at 5:00, I'm still doing the prep. I'm tying to brown the chicken that I spent 10 min. chopping into bite-sized pieces, while chopping the vegetables that I just washed, at the same time as cooking the noodles that need to go into the dish before I add the soup that's still in the cold room in the basement, and then there's the cheese that needs to be grated... ahhhh!
I started doubling the prep times that were provided and even then I was still running behind! Instead of alleviating my stress, these so-called simple meals were doubling, even tripling it! Until one magical day I tried a recipe that laughingly suggested a prep time of 5 min. 5 minutes? Yeah, right. I knew what that really meant. At 4:30, with 2 relatively happy kids, I began my dinner preparations. And, no word of a lie, by 4:37 my casserole was ready for the oven. Hallelujah! Either I was becoming master of my own kitchen or this recipe was the miracle I'd been waiting for. Later meals would prove I was indeed not the master of my kitchen; therefore, it follows that this recipe is special. So if you ever need a truly simple, quick meal option, and if you're tired of all the lies, then you should try this recipe. After all, we could all use a miracle now and then.
Cheesy Chicken and Rice Bake
Prep Time: 5 min. Bake Time: 45 min.
1 can cream of chicken soup
1 1/3 cups water
3/4 cup uncooked regular white rice
1/2 tsp. onion powder
1/4 tsp. pepper
2 cups fresh, canned, or frozen veggies of your choice
2-4 skinless, boneless chicken breasts
1 cup shredded Cheddar cheese
Mix soup, water, rice, onion powder, pepper, and veggies in 2 qt. shallow baking dish. Top with chicken. Sprinkle chicken with additional pepper.
Cover and bake at 375 for 45 min. or until chicken is no longer pink and rice is done. Top with cheese.
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I'm with you on the lies - I hate those friggin recipes. And I will definitely try this recipe sometime soon. If you get the Kraft magazine sent to you there is a really good tex mex casserole that I made last week that you should try. It took no more than 15min to prepare before going in the oven and was a crowd pleaser.
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