Old school “forgotten” chicken and rice for when dinner = comfort

Life might be a stormy sea, but dinner is an island. The older I get, the more important it is to me, the moment to sit down and look my people in the eye. This is why, when I know a good friend is having a hard time, and I want to do something helpful to comfort them, I like to bring something simple, easy and familiar to put in their oven.

My go-to dish is a take on a casserole from the bad-old, Betty Crocker days of yesteryear. It isn’t beautiful, but it hits important nostalgic notes. It’s a (gasp) cream-of-mushroom soup casserole known in Pinterest-y circles as “Forgotten Chicken,”  updated, veggified and sans-MSG. The beauty of it is it just slow cooks in the oven for two hours and nobody has to worry about it. (Sometimes I slip it in the oven before I pick the kids up from school. And BOOOOM: dinner is served two hours later.)

I made it just this last weekend for my friend Becca who spent a day in the ER with a sick kid while her husband was out of town. She sent me the photo above to say thanks.

The natural food section boxed cream of mushroom is key. (The stuff in the regular soup section is pretty gross in the sodium/MSG department.) I sometimes also throw in carrots if I have them. I always use a disposable pan when I’m making it for somebody else. That way they don’t have to worry about getting it back to you and they don’t have to wash it.

New School Forgotten Chicken and Rice

Ingredients: 

(A disposable baking pan)

Two ribs celery, finely chopped, including greens

Two carrots (optional), peeled and chopped on the diagonal

One 8-ounce box chopped fresh mushrooms

One 15 ounce box/can health food-section cream-of-mushroom soup that does not contain MSG (or the old school stuff if you want)

Two tablespoons tamari or soy sauce

1 1/2 cups short grain brown rice

About six chicken pieces, organic skin-on thighs preferred

2 cups water

1 cup milk or cream

2 tablespoons dried onion

1 tablespoon fresh thyme

Pepper

Instructions:

Preheat over to 350º

Mix mushrooms, celery, carrots if you’ve got ’em and rice in the baking pan. Nestle chicken on top. In a separate bowl, whisk soup with water, milk/cream and soy sauce, until the soup concentrate is dissolved. Pour over chicken. Shake onions over the chicken and sprinkle thyme. Give it a dose of pepper. Cover tightly with foil. Bake two hours or until the rice is no longer toothsome.