Casseroles are super quick, easy, and budget friendly. A casserole consists of a few ingredients mixed together and baked in the oven. I'm sure you're familiar some already....macaroni and cheese, scalloped potatoes and ham, enchiladas, or lasagna...just to name a few.
You can whip one up in less than 10 minutes for tonight's supper or next week's party. They're the perfect make ahead dish and a lot of them taste better the second day anyway. Preparation is fastest using a canned soup or sauce, while making a classic Bechamel sauce is more authentic and, in some cases, tastier. I grew up in a casserole rich environment so they're a comfort food for me. You can easily add these easy dishes to your repertoire with a little practice.
Here are the basic ingredients...
1. (1 part) Meat......This can be any kind of cooked meat. A bit of leftover meat is perfect for a casserole. ***Ham, Pork Chops, Pork Roast, Bacon, Sausage, Hamburger, Steak, Roast Beef, Cubed Steaks, Kielbasa, Bratwurst, Chicken, Turkey, Ground Turkey, Shellfish, or Fish.*** You can even mix meats together. I like a chicken and bacon combo. Never use uncooked meat because it takes too long to get enough heat into the center of the casserole to cook it properly. I refuse to serve a big helping of food poisoning to my family. (The exception to this might be fish if the casserole is cooked in a shallow dish.)
2. (2 parts) Starch...***Rice, Potatoes, Pasta, or Grains.*** My favorite is potatoes but pasta and rice work just as well. The starch helps bind the casserole together, fills tummies up, and stretches the meat making the dish more economical. I tend to like tomato based sauces with pasta and cream soups/Bechamel sauces with potatoes and rice. You can use minute rice, or leftover rice, baked or mashed potatoes, frozen french fries/hash browns/tater tots, raw thinly sliced potatoes. Pasta can be leftovers, freshly cooked or uncooked. If using uncooked pasta add extra sauce to the casserole and mix in the pasta, or layer it with sauce on both sides, to make sure all the pasta has some sauce on it. Let it sit, covered, in the refrigerator for 24 hours before cooking and the pasta comes out perfectly. This is especially true for lasagna. I double the amount of sauce when using uncooked pasta. I use cooked grains like quinoa, barley, and oats occasionally for casseroles but usually as a last resort, or for a specific recipe.
3. (1 to 2 parts) Vegetables...I use fresh or frozen veges. Canned veges get too soggy. Look for fresh vegetables in season whenever possible. I rely on the big 3 in my house as a staple for most of my cooking....onions, carrots, & celery. I always have these on hand and will add other veges when I have them. ***Peas, Asparagus, Broccoli, Cabbage, Turnips, Carrots, Onions, Celery, Green Beans, Tomatoes, Eggplant, Squash, Kohlrabi, Bell Peppers, Hot Peppers, Spinach, Brussell Sprouts, Olives, etc.*** Use whatever combination of veges your family likes. We don't personally like turnips or eggplant, so I never use them.
4. (Varies...see note below) Sauce...This can be canned cream of something Soup, Tomato based sauce, Bechamel sauce, or other roux based sauce using Cream, Sour Cream, Salsa, Cheese, etc.. (Find a basic Bechamel sauce recipe at the end of this post.)
5. Toppings and Extras...Don't forget to add your favorite herbs & spices. ***Tarragon, Rosemary, Thyme, Garlic or Garlic Powder, Hot Pepper Flakes, Salt Free Seasoning Blends, Pepper, Onion Powder, Oregano, Cumin, Cinnamon, Nutmeg, etc.*** Be watchful of salt when using canned soups. Get a low sodium variety or don't add salt to the meat when precooking. Also watch out for garlic or onion salt. Use garlic or onion powder instead. Its always easier to add salt later than it is to fix an over salted dish. Many recipes call for toppings. Sometimes I use them, sometimes I don't but they aren't absolutely necessary. Try these...***Crushed Corn Flakes, Crushed Potato Chips, Seasoned or Unseasoned Bread Crumbs (mixed with a little melted butter), and my favorite...CHEESE!***
NOTE: Think of the measurements in loose terms. 1 part meat could mean 1 cup or 1 lb. Either way, adjusting the amount of the ingredients is easy. You could have a purely vegetarian dish or one with no meat or veges at all. The key is the sauce. I mix my meat, starch, and vegetables together before adding the sauce. Generally, 2 cups of sauce will be sufficient for a casserole, for a family of 4, where the meat measures about 1/2lb, starch measures 1 to 2 cups, and the veges measure about a cup. The casserole should look quite wet and soggy, but not as thin as soup, before being cooked. If you have added your basic sauce and it doesn't look like enough stir in additional water, cream, or milk. If you're a beginner I suggest using other people's recipes a few times to recognize the right consistency before setting out on the throw it together path.
Texture: Some people may be turned off to casseroles that are either chunky or too smooth. I like something in between so I chop my meat and vegetables fairly small. If your family likes chunky foods you could chop them quite coarsely. Sometimes texture, instead of taste, makes the difference between a great dish and one nobody will eat. I will saute the vegetables when they're cut larger to give them a head start on cooking, otherwise, they don't need it. A food processor with a slicing blade makes thin sliced potatoes in a jiffy. The shredding blade could be incorporated for carrots, broccoli stalks, and cheese too. I don't recommend shredding and using raw potatoes as they release too much starch at once and will become globby. As a general rule, the vegetables will cook more evenly if they're close to the same size.
Make Ahead: Casseroles are the perfect make ahead dish. Assemble and bake up to a month ahead and freeze. Thaw in the refrigerator for 24 hours, reheat in the oven at 350 degrees until heated through, or microwave individual servings. If I know I'll be freezing it ahead, I use heavy duty tin foil in the pan. Make as directed. Let cool completely and cover with another layer of foil. Place pan in the freezer until the casserole is completely frozen. Remove the foiled food from the pan and wrap tightly, adding more foil as needed. Label with the date, reheating instructions, and name of dish before placing back in the freezer. You can then use the pan for other things. I will also use bread loaf pans to make several small casseroles at once. I mix all the ingredients together in a large bowl before dividing the mixture evenly between the foil lined pans. Then bake, cool, freeze, wrap, & label. This works well for families with less than 4 people. You can use an actual casserole dish (like Corning Ware, or other oven safe dish), an aluminum cake pan, bread loaf pans, pie plates, or even custard cups to make casseroles. (The custard cups are perfect for individual servings.) Simply adjust the cooking times for each.
Cooking Times: I cook casseroles at 350 degrees. This isn't a hard and fast rule, though. Anything between 300 degrees and 400 degrees will work. The higher the temperature, the shorter the cooking time. But, be aware that a good casserole needs at least 30 minutes of cook time to marry the flavors, cook the vegetables thoroughly, and thicken. The time will depend more on what kind of dish I'm using. A shallow or individual sized dish will take 30-40 minutes, while a large casserole bowl will take an hour or more. I don't bother to use a thermometer because my meats are all precooked. I'll stir a thick casserole once or twice and look for an even consistency and bubbling heat in the center.
Basic Bechamel Sauce:
5 tablespoons butter
1/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 quart milk
2 teaspoons salt
Melt butter in a large saucepan over medium heat. Once melted, stir in the flour until smooth. Continue stirring as the flour cooks to a light, golden, sandy color, about 7 minutes.
Increase heat to medium-high and slowly whisk in milk until thickened by the roux. Bring to a gentle simmer, then reduce heat to medium-low and continue simmering until the flour has softened and not longer tastes gritty, 10 to 20 minutes, then season with salt.
(This sauce recipe may look familiar as it becomes milk gravy when all or part of the fat is meat drippings....my favorite gravy!)
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