Category: Main Dishes

Pesto Chicken

Man, I love pesto chicken SO much. It’s one of my very favorite meals. Garlic, basil, cheese, and tomato combine so well. You can make this as separate chicken breasts in a pan, or you can mix cubed chicken and cut up tomato with sauce in the pasta. Either way is delicious, but the separate chicken breasts in the pan seems a little more special for special occasions.

And good news, this one is naturally gluten free–just serve it with gluten free noodles.

Make it a meal with:

  • Pasta
  • Garlic Bread or Breadsticks
  • Corn or Green Beans
  • Fresh Fruit

Pesto Chicken

  • Servings: 6
  • Difficulty: easy
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Absolutely delicious, great for special occasions or weeknight dinners.

Ingredients

  • 3 large Chicken Breasts, fileted in half so they’re half the thickness (6 total pieces)
  • Salt and pepper to taste
  • 10 oz. jar Basil Pesto
  • 2 large Tomatoes, sliced
  • Sliced or shredded Mozzarella
  • Parmesan cheese (optional)

Directions

Place the fileted chicken breasts in a greased 9×13 pan and season with salt and pepper. Spoon the pesto over the chicken. Then cover each chicken with 1-2 tomato slices (salted and peppered), and top with cheese. (Optional: Sprinkle parmesan over all.) Cook at 375° for about 30-45 minutes or until the temperature reaches 165°. Also broil to melt the cheese until slightly golden brown at the end. Serve with pasta, and make sure to spoon the delicious liquid from the pan over the pasta.


Crepes

Crepes are always a lot of fun and are great for special occasions. We often make crepes for date night, and we always make them on Christmas for a brunch with family. Haha, usually when we make them for date night, we end up standing the whole time while we eat because we stand by the stove and eat them as they come off the pan. They do tend to cool down very quickly, so we try to add Nutella quickly so it’ll melt a little. If you’re going to make a lot for a big event, make sure to start a long time before the event (like an hour) because they do take time.

For date night, we usually stick to ham, cheese, and broccoli crepes for the savory. Then for the sweet ones, we usually fill them with Nutella, peanut butter, and bananas. And sometimes also strawberries. And of course whipped cream.

But for Christmas, we go all out and make a crepe bar with all sorts of toppings. For example, we might have the standard ham and cheese, cooked broccoli, bananas, strawberries, Nutella, peanut butter, other berries, rotisserie chicken pieces, peppers, scrambled eggs, salsa, sausage, bacon, green onions, nuts for sweet crepes, whipped cream, powdered sugar, jam, and even pizza toppings like pasta sauce, mozzarella, and pepperoni. You can also have some sides with it, like rosemary potatoes (which works well if we have leftover baked potatoes from Christmas Eve dinner the night before) or wild rice. I’ve even made the sauce from our cordon bleu recipe, which tastes great with rotisserie chicken crepes, but I think most people weren’t sure what the sauce would taste like and so avoided it. Since the crepes cool so quickly, you may want to have an electric skillet out to heat up the crepes or let people microwave them to melt the cheese.

If you’re making it gluten free, of course replace the regular flour with cup for cup gluten free flour and add a tablespoon or two extra to make it the right consistency. We’ve done it a few times without adding the extra flour, and it’s been so thin that they ripped like crazy. But it works well when you add a little extra. Of course if you’re having an event with both regular and gluten free crepes, just be careful if you’re trying to avoid cross contamination to make your gluten free crepes first and take your toppings before everyone else. And make sure to use fresh or dedicated peanut butter, Nutella, jam, etc. so you don’t end up with people’s crumbs from previous uses. I’ve also made it dairy free with almond milk.

Make it a meal with:

  • Sausage
  • Scrambled Eggs
  • Rosemary Potatoes
  • Juice

Crepes

  • Servings: 10?
  • Difficulty: easy
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Fun for dates and special occasions, but they get cold quickly.

Ingredients

  • 1 ½ c. Milk (or almond milk for dairy free)
  • 2 Eggs
  • 1 c. Flour (or gluten free flour with xanthan gum, plus a few tablespoons extra)
  • ¼ tsp. Salt
  • 1 Tbsp. Oil

Topping suggestions

  • Ham Slices
  • Cheese Slices or Shredded Cheese
  • Cooked Broccoli
  • Rotisserie Chicken
  • Nutella
  • Peanut Butter
  • Sliced Bananas
  • Sliced Strawberries
  • Whipped Cream

Directions

Place liquid ingredients in the bottom of a blender, then add rest of ingredients and blend until very smooth. About 3 Tbsp. of batter per crepe makes 10-12 crepes. Heat a pan over medium-high heat and butter the bottom of the pan. Then add the batter and swirl around to cover the bottom of the pan. When the edges are starting to peel away from the edge, use a spatula to flip. For ham, cheese, and broccoli crepes, now is the time to add about 2 cheese slices to the pan, then 4 slices of ham on top. Then add a few broccoli florets and roll up the crepe. For sweet crepes, take the crepe out of the pan after flipping, and while it’s hot, spread Nutella and peanut butter down the middle of the crepe, then add banana and strawberries, then roll up.


Cowboy Surprise

I think in the strictest sense, cowboy surprise basically meant whatever the cowboy had ended up in the pot. But we’ve standardized it a little more (although not with terribly exact measurements), occasionally adding some extra stuff from our fridge like leftover bell peppers or vegetables. It’s kind of like a fancy Hamburger Helper, haha. But it’s pretty cheap and makes lots of good leftovers.

If you’re making it gluten free, I find that gluten free rotini holds up the best. But any gluten free pasta does tend to fall apart eventually, especially with stirring or after microwaving as a leftover. And condensed tomato soup does have flour, so make sure to use the substitute.

Make it a meal with:

  • Corn or green beans
  • Fresh Fruit

Cowboy Surprise

  • Servings: 8?
  • Difficulty: easy
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Fast and easy, and it makes lots of leftovers.

Ingredients

  • 3 c. Macaroni (uncooked) (or gluten free rotini)
  • 1-2 lbs. Hamburger
  • 1 Onion, minced
  • 2 tsp. Minced Garlic
  • 2 cans Tomato Soup
    • For gluten free, use:
    • 16 oz. Tomato Sauce
    • 1 Tbsp. Sugar
    • 2 Tbsp. Cornstarch
    • 1 tsp. Salt
  • ½ c. Ketchup
  • 1 heaping Tbsp. Brown Sugar (about)
  • ½ tsp. Chili Powder
  • Salt and Pepper to taste
  • 2 c. Shredded Cheddar Cheese

Directions

Cook the pasta and drain. To save a pan, you can cook the rest in that same pan, then add back the macaroni. Cook hamburger and onion, then combine remaining ingredients in pot on stove and heat. Make sure it’s sweet enough. Add cheese at end. For gluten free, make sure to adjust flavors as much as possible before adding pasta because it will fall apart more easily with stirring.


Cordon Bleu

I like to make cordon bleu on Sundays or special occasions. They do take a little more effort because you have to pound out the chicken and assemble it, but I often make a big pan of 10 cordon bleus and freeze the leftovers with sauce.

I generally like to have everything laid out and ready at the beginning so it goes fast once you start. Also, I take out the exact number of ham and cheese slices beforehand that I need so that I won’t contaminate the whole package with my chicken-covered hands. It’s a messy job to assemble the cordon bleu–you can use latex gloves or try the technique of having one “dry” hand for breadcrumbs and one “wet” hand for dipping in butter. But it’ll be fairly messy no matter what.

You can use regular breadcrumbs or Italian breadcrumbs. Growing up we always had plain, but lately I’ve really enjoyed the extra flavor from the Italian. You can always make your own Italian breadcrumbs by shaking some Italian seasoning into plain breadcrumbs. Also growing up, we used to secure the rolled up chicken with toothpicks. But I’ve found that if I roll them and pack them fairly tightly (like 10 in a 9×13 pan), they’ll cook and hold their shapes. Then you don’t have to pull out the extra toothpicks before eating.

If you’re making it gluten free, just swap out the breadcrumbs for gluten free breadcrumbs or crushed Rice or Corn Chex. You can still add Italian seasoning if you want more flavor. And if you’re making the sauce, use a gluten free cream of chicken soup.

Make it a meal with:

  • Baked Potatoes, Risotto, or Pasta Roni
  • Green Beans
  • Waldorf Salad

Cordon Bleu

  • Servings: 10
  • Difficulty: medium-hard
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A nicer, fancier meal that takes more time but also freezes well.

Ingredients

  • 5 large Chicken Breasts, fileted in half so they’re half the thickness
  • 10 Ham Slices
  • 10 Swiss Cheese Slices
  • 1/4 c. Melted Butter in a bowl
  • 1/2 c. + Bread Crumbs with extra Italian seasoning if desired (or gluten free breadcrumbs or crushed Corn Chex) in a bowl

Sauce for Topping (I often double this if I’m making 10, depending who likes sauce)

  • 1 can Cream of Chicken Soup (or gluten free cream of chicken soup)
  • ½ c. Sour Cream
  • 1 tsp. Lemon Juice

Directions

On a cutting board, cover a fileted chicken breast with plastic wrap to prevent splashes. Then pound out chicken so that it’s thin and even. Put down one slice of ham on the flattened chicken and then one slice of cheese. Roll tightly then dip in bread crumbs, then butter, then bread crumbs again. Place in greased glass 9×13 pan. Pack tightly to keep cheese from melting out too much. Cook at 375° for about 45 minutes to 1 hour when tightly packed or until the internal temperature reaches 165°.

For the sauce, mix the ingredients and bring to a gentle boil. Spoon over cordon bleu.


Corn Cakes

Jiffy has changed its recipe on the box over the years, but these are still delicious pancakes that need nothing but some melted butter and syrup.

If you want to make this gluten free, you’ll have to find a different recipe because Jiffy doesn’t make gluten free corn muffin mix.

Make it a meal with:

  • Sausage or Bacon
  • Scrambled Eggs
  • Juice

Corn Cakes

  • Servings: 8 small pancakes?
  • Difficulty: easy
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A nice twist on regular pancakes.

Ingredients

  • 1 pkg. Jiffy Corn Muffin Mix
  • 1 Egg
  • 2 Tbsp. melted Butter or Shortening
  • ¾ c. Milk

Directions

Preheat griddle to 350. Blend ingredients. Batter will be slightly lumpy. Spoon onto griddle and cook like standard pancakes.


Chicken Gravy & Dumplings

We make this meal without dumplings a lot, because it’s easy, we always have the ingredients in our house, and it’s a nice, warm, mild meal that’s easy on an upset stomach. It’s kind of our go-to, served on rice, if someone’s having stomach issues.

Also, the dumplings are surprisingly simple and delicious. You wouldn’t think canned biscuits would make very good dumplings or that they would taste artificial or something, but they’re wonderful. FYI, they do tend to soak up a lot of gravy while cooking, so you may want to add an extra can of soup. And sometimes when you microwave the dumplings as a leftover, they can get a little hard.

If you’re making this gluten free, make sure to swap out the regular cream of chicken soup for the gluten free kind and of course leave out the dumplings.

Make it a meal with:

  • Rice, Mashed Potatoes, Baked Potatoes, or Noodles
  • Green Beans
  • Fresh Fruit or Jell-O

Chicken Gravy & Dumplings

  • Servings: 6?
  • Difficulty: easy
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Easy, mild, and comforting for a quick dinner or for upset stomachs.

Ingredients

  • 2-3 lb. Chicken breasts, cubed
  • 2 cans Cream of Chicken Soup (or gluten free cream of chicken)
  • Morton Season All Seasoned Salt
  • 1 can Milk
  • Optional: 1 can Biscuits

Directions

In a deep pan on the stove or a large electric skillet, brown cubed chicken and sprinkle seasoned salt all over top. Add the soup to the chicken, then pour milk in the soup cans and swirl around to get out as much as possible, then pour in with the chicken. Mix and heat until smooth. For optional dumplings, turn down the heat to low and place the biscuits on top of the chicken and gravy, then cover with a lid and barely simmer for 10-15 minutes or until the dumplings are no longer doughy inside. Serve on top of rice, potatoes, or noodles.


Chicken Linguine

Once again, this recipe comes from the time when I lived with Grandpa and he was trying to eat lower-sodium meals. It was originally a side dish on Mrs. Dash’s website, but I updated it with chicken and a few other ingredients, and eventually added more salt after the low-sodium diet was over.

The house smells so amazing and full of spices when this meal is cooking, and it makes nice leftovers. I generally serve it using tongs because the noodles are long and the chicken is hard to grab with a pasta server. But you can use any pasta with this recipe, really. And you might need to add a lot of extra Mrs. Dash, just according to your taste preference.

If you’re making this gluten free, just make sure to use gluten free pasta. Everything else is gluten free naturally–just make sure your cheese hasn’t been contaminated.

Make it a meal with:

Chicken Linguine

  • Servings: 6?
  • Difficulty: medium
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Healthier, but very aromatic and delicious.

Ingredients

  • 1 box uncooked Fettuccine or Linguine (or gluten free pasta)
  • 2-4 Chicken Breasts, cubed
  • 2 ½ Tbsp. Olive Oil
  • 2 Tbsp.+ Mrs. Dash Garlic & Herb Seasoning, to taste
  • 1 Red Pepper, sliced
  • 1 Yellow pepper, sliced
  • 2 c. chopped Broccoli or Asparagus
  • ¼ c. Lemon Juice
  • ¾ c. Shredded Provolone/Mozzarella Blend
  • Salt and Pepper to taste

Directions

Prepare pasta according to package directions, and cook chicken. Place chicken in bowl, then heat olive oil in pan. Add vegetables and Mrs. Dash Seasoning. Cook until tender, about 8 minutes. Toss together with pasta, chicken, vegetables, and lemon juice. Mix in cheese and stir until melted, then add salt and pepper to taste.


Chicken Noodle Soup

This soup tastes so wonderfully of childhood, I make it even in the summer. I love how the whole house fills with the warm aroma of cooking chicken and a light oniony broth. Haha, when I worked at Harmons, we had a meeting every week and started off by saying the best thing we ate the last week–I said so often that my favorite thing was homemade chicken noodle soup, that my coworkers started to request that I bring it in one day, since it was apparently so delicious. I never actually did, though. I did make it for a district meeting on my mission once, though. Haha, except it sat on the stove the whole meeting and the bottom burned, and the noodles turned to mush. It still tasted pretty good, though.

In all fairness, I don’t know that it’s such an amazingly stellar recipe so much as it reminds me of warm, comforting days with my mom. Of sneaking pieces of chicken, and one time being bold enough to ask my mom if I could eat one of the wings. She kindly obliged, smiled, put some salt on the wing, and handed it to me, letting me enjoy the whole thing.

I also remember my mom, at my request, teaching us for a Young Women’s activity about how to make a meal when our mom was sick. So she taught us how to make chicken noodle soup and blueberry muffins. Some girls didn’t want to get their hands goopy in breaking down the chicken, but I never minded. Plus, you get to sneak lots of pieces of chicken yourself. I’ve made this soup so many times in my life, and I look forward to making it with my girls.

If you’re making this gluten free, make sure to use Members Mark Chicken Base from Sam’s Club or Better Than Bouillon instead of bouillon cubes. And I generally cook the noodles separately and add them in after because gluten free noodles tend to fall apart in soup. So the smallest amount of time the noodles can be in the soup, the better.

Make it a meal with:

  • Muffins or Rolls
  • Fresh Fruit

Chicken Noodle Soup

  • Servings: 8?
  • Difficulty: medium
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Warm and comforting, but it takes tons of time to make.

Ingredients

  • 1 whole Chicken, washed and cleaned out
  • Water to cover chicken
  • 4-5 Chicken Bouillon Cubes (or 4-5 tsp. Members Mark Chicken Base)
  • 2 Bay Leaves
  • 2 Carrots
  • 1 Onion, chopped
  • Optional: 2 whole stalks Celery
  • Salt and Pepper to taste
  • ½ bag Egg Noodles (or 1/2 box gluten free rotini)
  • ~½ c. frozen Peas
  • ~½ c. frozen Corn

Directions

In large pot, cover chicken with water. Place bouillon cubes, bay leaves, carrots, and onion in water. Optional: Add 2 whole stalks of celery for flavor. Boil for 1 hour, occasionally skimming off foam on top. Remove bay leaves and celery, then remove celery stalks and chicken from water and let cool in a pan for about 20 minutes. (Cools faster if you use a spoon to separate off large chunks while hot.) Once cool, pull chicken off bone and place bite-size chunks in broth. Add salt and pepper to taste. Soup always needs lots of salt and sometimes another bouillon cube or two for flavor. Add egg noodles and boil for 8 minutes, then remove from heat and add peas and corn–or cook the gluten free noodles separately and add them to each person’s bowl individually before adding broth.


Chicken Grape Cashew Salad

If you’re making a salad that will be eaten in one sitting, you can mix the mayo right in with everything. But generally we can’t finish the whole salad in one meal and need to make containers of leftovers, so I almost always leave out the mayo and mix it separately per serving. If you mix the mayo with the whole salad and then make leftovers after, it does tend to get slimy fairly quickly, FYI.

If you’re making this gluten free, it’s naturally gluten free as long as you use a new jar of mayo or one that’s dedicated gluten free (so you don’t get crumbs from previous sandwich making).

Make it a meal with:

Chicken Grape Cashew Salad

  • Servings: 6?
  • Difficulty: easy
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Light and easy, but it does take a little time to cut and assemble everything.

Ingredients

  • 3 lb. Chicken Breasts, cubed and cooked (or 1 rotisserie chicken, pulled)
  • 1 bag Salad or Spinach
  • 1 bunch washed Grapes
  • 1-2 c. Cashews
  • 1-2 stalks fine-cut Celery
  • 2 sliced Green Onions
  • Mayonnaise (or new jar/dedicated gluten free jar)
  • Salt to taste

Directions

Cook cubed chicken, adding salt and pepper to taste. Combine rest of ingredients except mayonnaise in a bowl, generally keeping everything on top of the lettuce because everything will fall to the bottom otherwise. Add mayo separately per portion and mix in, to keep leftovers from getting slimy.


Pot Roast

Since pot roast and beef soup have basically the same ingredients, you can make a soup out of this if you just cut up the beef and vegetables beforehand. Also, for pot roast, I love to make gravy with the tons of leftover juice. It’s wonderful to freeze the gravy and use later for Hamburger Gravy, Beef Pot Pies, or Beef and Gravy served over noodles.

If you’re making it gluten free, make sure to use Members Mark Beef Base or Better Than Bouillon (or gluten free bouillon cubes if you can find any), and make the gravy with cornstarch.

Make it a meal with:

Pot Roast or Beef Soup

  • Servings: 8?
  • Difficulty: easy
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It’s basically the same ingredients for beef soup or pot roast.

Ingredients

  • 3-4 lbs. Beef (chuck roast or brisket for pot roast)
  • 4-6 Potatoes, chopped large
  • 3-4 Carrots, chopped large or 4 c. Baby Carrots
  • 1 Onion, chopped large
  • About 4-6 c. Water (to cover)
  • 4-6 Beef Bouillon Cubes (or 4-6 tsp. Members Mark Beef Base)
  • 1 Bay Leaf
  • 1+ tsp. Salt to taste
  • Pepper to taste
  • Optional: Flour (or cornstarch) for gravy (such as 1 c. cornstarch, 1 c. water, depending on how much broth you have)

Directions

For pot roast, place beef in slow cooker and cover with water. Chop all the vegetables large so they don’t get mushy after the long cook time. Add the remaining ingredients except the flour. For the soup, you can use any of several kinds of beef, including rump roast or sirloin–it just needs to cook a long time to get tender. Cook for 4-5 hours on high or 8-10 hours on low until the meat is tender enough. If using a big pot rather than a slow cooker, cook soup for 1 hour (beef may be tougher with this method). Remove bay leaf before serving.

For pot roast gravy: Remove everything from the juice, then pour the juice through a strainer into a pot. Bring to a boil. In a bowl, whisk together flour or cornstarch and water until no lumps remain, then add to the juice, whisking constantly. If the gravy is too runny after it comes to a boil, add more whisked flour and water. Salt and pepper to taste.