Chicken Tetrazzini

Sometimes a girl just wants pasta.

It was my turn to cook this Wednesday and I decided to make something involving pasta. When I say I “decided,” please know that I’ve been fretting about the menu for days and once I decided what to make, I spent the next several days looking for just the right recipe.

Chicken Tetrazzini made the cut.

Tetrazzini is made with chicken or turkey, mushrooms, onions, and celery doused with a cheesy cream sauce flavored with sherry, mixed with pasta and baked. It is believed that this delicious dish – created by an American chef – is named in honor an Italian opera star, Luisa Tetrazzini, who was a long time resident of California.

Listen to the spirited soprano sing here.

This easy casserole is a fancy way to use leftover spaghetti, chicken or turkey.

Chicken Tetrazzini
From myrecipes.com

1 Tablespoon butter
½ cup finely chopped onion
½ cup finely chopped celery
½ teaspoon of salt
¼ teaspoon of pepper
2 (8 ounce) packages of sliced mushrooms
¼ cup dry sherry or red wine
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1 ½ cans of chicken broth
1 cup freshly grated Parmesan cheese
¼ cup of low-fat cream cheese
3 cups of cooked spaghetti
2 cups of cooked, chopped chicken
1 cup of panko bread crumbs
Chopped parsley
¼ cup Parmesan cheese

Directions
Preheat oven to 350°. Melt butter in a large pan over medium high heat. Add onion, celery, salt, pepper and mushrooms. Sauté 4 minutes or until mushrooms are tender. Add sherry and cook for 1 minute. Gradually add flour and cook for three minutes, stirring constantly. The mixture will be thick. Gradually add broth, stirring constantly. Bring to a boil, reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes, stirring frequently.

Remove the mixture from the heat and add 1 cup of Parmesan cheese and the cream cheese, stirring until the cheeses melt. Add the pasta and chicken and mix until blended. Add to a baking dish, sprinkle with bread crumbs and ¼ cup Parmesan cheese. Bake for 35 minutes or until lightly browned. Let sit for 10 minutes before serving. Garnish with chopped parsley.

We also had a field green, pistachio and goat cheese salad served in the lovely traveling salad bowl and a fantastic bottle of French red wine and vanilla ice cream with bananas and caramel sauce for dessert.

We had a nice evening chatting about our various trips, including my trip earlier in the week to the beautiful land of the Philadelphia impound lot with its rolling barbed wire and serene European surroundings (IKEA)...more on that later.