Poppy seed chicken casserole

Poppy seed chicken

The annual Mayhew/Harbin/Mayhew reunion will commence promptly sometime Sunday whenever we feel like getting to the Smoky Mountain cabin we rent every year.

That is kind of an inside joke because nothing commences promptly in our week together. It is well understood and agreed upon by all parties that there are no rules, there are no organized activities and nobody has to do anything they don’t want to do. That’s why — after about a decade of reunions — we still like each other tremendously.

Of course I have been obsessing over what to cook. Tammy, my daughter-in-law, is not enthusiastic in the kitchen so she has become the frozen snack lady. Bunny, my mother-in-law, is queen of the slow cooker (her corned beef and cabbage is unrivaled in all of Eastern Tennessee and perhaps the world. And I am the griller and casserole lady.

So I noticed this the other day as I was perusing 452 cookbooks for a casserole recipe I have not yet made. Fancy cookbooks do not have casseroles. I know casseroles are not a Southern-only thing because there are pot luck suppers all over the country and casseroles appear at each and every one of them. But you won’t find recipes for them in books by chefs, television personalities or food critics.

So for our first night at the cabin I am making my famous-in-my-own-mind poppy seed chicken casserole. It is a celebration of excess from the cream cheese and sour cream in the sauce to the buttery Ritz cracker topping. Try it. You’ll thank me. Or I’m sorry.

 

Poppy seed chicken casserole
 
Ingredients
  • 1 rotisserie chicken
  • 3 tablespoons butter
  • 1 teaspoon minced garlic
  • 3 tablespoons flour
  • 1 cup milk
  • 1 cup chicken broth
  • 4 ounces cream cheese
  • 8 ounces sour cream
  • 1 ½ teaspoons salt
  • ½ teaspoon ground pepper
  • 1 tablespoon poppy seeds
  • ½ cup shredded Parmesan cheese
  • 1 sleeve Ritz crackers, crushed into crumbs
  • 4 tablespoons butter, melted
Instructions
  1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease a casserole dish.
  2. Shred the chicken from the rotisserie chicken. Reserve.
  3. Melt the butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Add the garlic and sauté for one minute until fragrant. Whisk in the flour and stir for about a minute.
  4. Gradually whisk the milk into the saucepan. Add the chicken broth, sour cream, cream cheese, salt and pepper. Simmer 5-10 minutes until the cream cheese melts, stirring occasionally.
  5. Add the shredded chicken and poppy seeds to the sauce and stir. Transfer to the casserole dish. Sprinkle with Parmesan cheese. Top with cracker crumbs and drizzle the melted butter over the top.
  6. Bake for 20-30 minutes, checking to make sure the cracker crumbs don’t get too brown.
 

Save

4 Comments

  1. Ruth Ann
    Ruth AnnReply
    August 13, 2016 at 9:22 pm

    You are a joy to read! And recipes are wonderful too!

    • Catherine Mayhew
      Catherine MayhewReply
      August 20, 2016 at 3:21 pm

      Thanks so much!

  2. Tammy Mayhew
    Tammy MayhewReply
    August 26, 2016 at 10:05 am

    Nana – You will be proud… I’m going to try this at home!

    • Catherine Mayhew
      Catherine MayhewReply
      August 28, 2016 at 4:12 pm

      Just like Sydney told me right before I jumped off the zip line platform, “You can do it!”

Leave a Reply

Your message*

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href="" title=""> <abbr title=""> <acronym title=""> <b> <blockquote cite=""> <cite> <code> <del datetime=""> <em> <i> <q cite=""> <strike> <strong>

Name*
Email*
Url

Rate this recipe:  

What is 14 + 12 ?
Please leave these two fields as-is:
IMPORTANT! To be able to proceed, you need to solve the following simple math (so we know that you are a human) :-)