Pioneer Woman's Chicken Spaghetti, with my personal spin.

I was home Thursday evening. I did work during the day, cleaning a church, an insurance agent's office, and two houses. But, I was home in the evening.  It's the first Thursday night that I have been home in a while. I am usually scheduled at Starbucks. Normally the hubby does frozen pizza on Thursday nights, but, since I knew I would be home I thought I would cook something and let him do frozen pizza Friday night, when I would be working.

I have been wanting to make this dish, Chicken Spaghetti, since I first saw it posted on Pioneer Woman's blog. It seemed pretty easy, just a few simple ingredients, and she said Marlboro Man loves it. I figured if her hardworking cowboy husband liked it, my hardworking redneck hubby would too.

I had cooked a whole chicken in my dutch oven, french style, on Sunday night, and had a fair amount of the chicken meat left over. Ree boils up a fryer the night she makes the dish, but I figured I could cheat and use the cooked chicken. I also took several other liberties with her recipe, but only because I didn't have some of the ingredients she calls for. If you want to make it Ree's way, click here. :) If you want to make it my way, I will post my variation of her recipe below. It's pretty much the same recipe, I just subbed out some things.

It took no time at all to whip it all together and pop it in the oven. It has to bake for 45 minutes, so I caught up on some emails and started some laundry. You could do the same, or maybe read a couple of chapters from a good book, or relax with a cup of coffee (or tea or even wine!) I put together a quick salad to serve along with the casserole. I thought about throwing some broccoli into the dish, but decided against it at the last minute. But, I bet it would be good.

The verdict? Delicious! I really liked it and the hubby did too. It was creamy and cheesy and such a different way to eat spaghetti. Very comfort food-like. I had big chunks of chicken in mine and whole wheat spaghetti, Everything blended together and we didn't even need to twirl the spaghetti to eat it! Easy peasy!

I am going to link this recipe to April's  Foodie Fans of the Pioneer Woman.

 Chicken Spaghetti

Adapted from The Pioneer Woman Cooks

Ingredients

2 cups cooked chicken

1/2 pound whole wheat spaghetti, broken into 2" pieces

1 can cream of chicken soup

1 can cream of celery soup

1 1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese, divided

2 carrots, finely chopped

2 celery sticks, finely chopped

1/2 onion, finely chopped

2 Roma tomatoes, finely chopped

3/4 teaspoon Seasoned salt

1/2 teaspoon garlic pepper

Chop up cooked chicken into bite-sized pieces.

Cook spaghetti until al dente. Do not overcook it as you will bake it and finish cooking it.

When spaghetti is cooked, combine it with all the remaining ingredients. Reserve 3/4 cup of the cheddar cheese.

Place all the ingredients into a casserole dish and sprinkle remaining cheese over the top. 

Bake in a 350 degree oven for 45 minutes until bubbly. 

Enjoy!!