Birthday Comfort Food: Comfort Definately Needed

Today was husband Bob's birthday. He loves when I make comfort food, it reminds him of his mom's cooking. Comfort food was definitely a good thing for tonight, as our 4 year-old is going thru "terrible 4's" (never knew there was such a thing). Yesterday, our babysitter had her in the longest time-out known to mankind. This is our angelic child, who usually is loved by all her teachers and her babysitter. She usually only tries to act up and assert her independence with me, since I'm the parents who is home the most. The last month has been a test of wills.

Today was finally a bit better. So I was able to find time to make bob his birthday dinner:

Chicken Pie

This is based on my mom's recipe. Basically, you take some leftover chicken and chop it up. Mix with a can of cream of chicken soup and half a can of water in a Pyrex pie plate. thrown in some frozen peas and carrots and then top with instant mashed potatoes and sprinkle with paprika. bake until potatoes a bit crispy and contents are hot.

I've varied this a bit. My mom usually would use a chicken leftover from making homemade soup. I usually buy a chicken from Sams Club and hack it up and use it for this dish and stuff like chicken salad. I like fresh carrots so I'll throw those in. It just takes a really long time in the oven for this mixture to warm up, which is tough when time is at a premium (i.e. 20 month-old is yelling at me for dinner).

My updated recipe: chop up some carrots (usually baby since that's what's in the house). throw them in the pie plate with a little water and nuke until tender. drain the water, then throw in frozen peas, reduced fat/salt cream of chicken soup and 1/2 can water, along with chopped roast chicken. nuke this mixture until heated thru a bit. then top with mashed potatoes and paprika and throw in oven. I usually will make my own mashed potatoes (Yukon golds with skim milk and a little butter) -or- buy pre-made mashed potatoes from the produce aisle. i don't love the instant ones.

tonight I cheated a bit and used a 1/2 can whole milk instead of water, and used whole milk in the mashed potatoes. SO good. and I roasted a head of garlic and spread that on rolls.
we felt better after this dinner. Especially when followed by a Wegmans Ultimate Chocolate Cake!

Notes: the picky now-evil 4-year-old eats the chicken plain, carrots plain and no mashed. i just put these things on the side before I mix the rest of it together.

also, put the pie plate on top of a cookie sheet so that the contents don't drip into your oven.

Note: I know this is now May 7th and this blog is from April 27. Oops, sorry, I'm a little behind!