Chicken Pot Pie is one of mine and Cobalt’s favorite dishes. Last night I was going to make King Ranch Chicken but realized that the ingredients I had would be much tastier in Chicken Pot Pie. So I made that instead.

What is absolutely fantastic about this meal is that it’s quick, simple and doesn’t dirty many pots and pans! In fact, it’s what I call a “dump” recipe. Not a nice sounding name, but it is when you realize that means you don’t have many dishes to wash (YAY!).

How simple is chicken pot pie exactly? you ask.

Well, to start, you only need four basic ingredients:

1. Sauce – canned cream of mushroom and/or cream of chicken soup (low sodium, low-fat or the original)
~$1/small can

2. Mixed veggies (frozen, canned or fresh) – carrots, peas, corn, lima beans, green beans
*if using fresh veggies then steam or grill them separately before adding them to the sauce
$1-$1.50/ frozen bag…75¢/can

3. Cooked, boneless chicken (canned, fresh or frozen)
*I’m estimating the prices on this one. All I really know is that canned is usually the most $$ per serving.
$2-3/can…$3-$4/fresh pkg…$6-$7/frozen bag

4. Biscuits or crust (homemade or store-bought dough)
$2-3/store-bought…$1-$2/homemade

= ~$7

*Note: Proportions don’t really matter. You can add as much or little as you want!

*Also, I wouldn’t add salt to any part of this recipe. The canned soup is pretty salty (though you can get the reduced salt type). And if you add canned chicken, that’s salty, too.

How to make it…

• Mix the sauce, veggies and chicken together.

*I like to heat up this sauce in a pan on the stove beforehand so it doesn’t take so long to warm up in the oven

• Dump it into a casserole dish/pie pan (make sure to grease it…makes for easy cleanup).

• Spoon the biscuit dough or roll out the crust on top.

• Cook in the oven at 350°F for 30 minutes or until biscuits or crust are golden brown and filling is bubbling around the sides of the dish (if you use a crust, cut some slits in the top with a sharp knife so you can see the filling inside).

*Note: If the casserole dish is over-filled, the filling might bubble out. Put the casserole dish on a baking sheet if this is the case.

Easy as pie.

Chicken Pot Pie that is.

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Last night I made – what I call – a “concoction” of sorts. It was so delicious that it replaced Cobalt’s favorite meal that I’ve made so far. Here’s are the ingredients I added to the pot in order. Do keep in mind that I’m an experimental cook and just kinda kept throwing things in my pot. So the order doesn’t matter all that much if you were wanting to follow this recipe :)

• 1 tsp olive oil
• 1/2-3/4 of a small onion diced
• 2 small mushrooms, diced
• 2 small cloves garlic, diced (sautéed with onions and mushrooms in the oil)
• 1 large can of cream of mushroom soup
• 1 can black beans
• 1/2 cup salsa (next time I won’t add this)
• 1 small yellow  pepper, diced (I won’t add this again either)
• 1 overflowing cup of cooked chicken, chopped small
• 2 whole carrots diced and steamed for 2 min. in microwave
• 1/2 TBS crushed dried rosemary
• 2-3 TBS flaxseed
• 2 stalks of celery, chopped
• 2 batches of biscuits without salt (1 cup whole wheat and 1 cup white flour, lots of flaxseed, milk not water, no salt or sugar, only leavening ingredients…see recipe for details)