Wok's For Dinner: Creamed Chicken & Biscuits, Carrot & Raisin Salad

Another crazy evening for our family. We thought our car was fixed, and then it overheated when my husband was on his way to pick me up from work. Our son had a field trip today to go strawberry picking, so it made more sense for my husband to drop me off at work after the field trip and pick me up when work was over. Needless to say, because the car overheated, we had to let it cool off a big and then slowly we made our way home, which meant getting home late. Some of the strawberry fields were muddy, and the kids were really grimy-looking, so both insisted on taking showers. Which meant starting supper late. Thank goodness I had a freezer meal thawing in the refrigerator, ready to pop into the oven! Unfortunately, it took twice as long to cook because it was still frozen! I've made this recipe many times since it is one of my hubs's favorites (even though he's recently learned that he's allergic to corn, he still wants to eat it). I've never made it as a freezer meal, but apparently when it freezes, it really freezes!

Creamed Chicken & Biscuits

Ingredients:

1/2 large onion

1 1/2 tsp butter (I think I had actually used about 1/2 Tbsp olive oil instead)

4 cups chopped cooked chicken

1 can (10 3/4 oz) reduced sodium cream of chicken soup

1 cup low-fat sour cream

1/2 cup skim milk

1/2 cup chopped pimiento

1 can no salt added corn

1 cup shredded Cheddar

6 frozen biscuits, thawed

Directions:

Grease the bottom and sides of a 13x9-inch baking dish. Chop the onion. Heat butter in a small nonstick skillet over medium-high heat until melted; stir in onion; saute' until tender. Combine onion, chicken, soup, sour cream, milk, pimiento and corn in a medium bowl and mix well. Spoon mixture into prepared baking dish. If freezing: Use a disposable baking dish for your mixture. Cover and freeze. Thaw 36-48 hours before heating & serving (I thawed for 24 hours; definitely not long enough). Bake in preheated oven for 15 minutes. Remove from oven. Sprinkle baked layer with 3/4 cup of shredded cheddar. Arrange thawed biscuits in a single layer over top. Sprinkle with remaining cheese. Bake until biscuits are golden brown and the sauce is bubbly, about 20 minutes longer. Serve immediately.

Because this took so long to cook, thanks in part to my lack of realizing how long it would take to thaw, I ended up making the kids grilled cheese sandwiches. They still had Carrot & Raisin Salad with their grilled cheese. My son loved the Carrot & Raisin salad, and ended up eating some of the Creamed Chicken & Biscuits before going to bed. My daughter, on the other hand, gets weirded out by funny textures. She loves pineapple, which I added to the salad, but she did not like the shredded carrot, so she didn't eat any of it. Oh well, I tried. Here's the recipe for Carrot & Raisin Salad.

Carrot & Raisin Salad

Ingredients:

4 carrots (medium), shredded (I used several baby carrots since that's all I had and shredded until I had about 4 cups worth)

1/4 cup raisins

2 tsp sugar

juice of one lemon (used only 1/2 lemon since I had a really large lemon)

Directions:

In a medium bowl, thoroughly mix carrots, raisins, sugar and lemon. Serve chilled.

I got this recipe a couple years ago from Health Media when I registered for the Balance Program at Blue Cross Blue Shield. I set it aside and didn't ever make it until coming across it a week ago, and thought I'd give it a try. It's really good and only 69 calories per serving! We had leftover fresh pineapple, so I added it to the recipe, which really added some zing and flavor.