Monday, October 6, 2008

Uses for cooked chicken

If you've started making cooked chicken and stock on your own, you may have cooked chicken lying around (hopefully in your freezer). Here are some favorite uses:

1. Slather some bread with mayonaise and top with chicken; salt if you didn't use much salt when making the chicken, and make a great sandwich.

2. Chicken pot pie--I don't yet have a favorite recipe, being torn between ease of preparation and healthiness, but my sister-in-law gave me a super easy one that I'd share and Cooking Light has a great-looking healthy one.

3. Quesadillas--top tortillas with chicken, green chilies, and cheddar cheese, add another tortilla, and bake or toast in skillet.

4. Chicken soup--saute some chopped up carrots, celery, and onion, add the stock, add some noodles or rice and simmer until soft, add chicken, season as desired, and serve.

5. Chicken Tetrazinni--there are all kinds of versions of this that require baking, but I don't see the point. I boil some spaghetti, and meanwhile I make a white sauce with the stock (you can also use can of creamed chicken soup). Stir in some grated cheddar, a bit of dried parslely, a can of drained mushrooms, and some chicken. Use as sauce over the spaghetti.

I hope you all don't mind the lack of precision. These recipes are all quite forgiving, so figure out what works for you, and if you have a specfic question let me know!

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

We also add BBQ sauce to cooked chicken for sandwiches. Also throw it in Chicken Fried Rice, which cuts down on the cooking time. Another helpful hint is to buy the 5 lb. package of frozen ground beef at Sams (ends up less than $2/lb.), cook it in the crock pot all day, drain and separate into containers and freeze. It is wonderful to have on hand for all kind of recipes.