We visited our daughter in Florida for
Thanksgiving and her spouses' mom put on a big spread. All the
traditional foods were on the table and there was plenty of it. So
when we left that beautiful home on the water, we brought back a huge
bag of turkey including the carcass.
The next day my BW picked through the
bag and separated all the meat. We decided to prepare a casserole
using items already on hand. Everyone raved about the casserole so I
thought I'd mention it here. It is not difficult to prepare and is a
taste sensation. I know because we all finished the casserole that
night. My daughter had these cans of soup in her cupboard and they became the flavour
base.
Turkey Pasta Casserole serves 8 normal people
Ingredients:
4-5 cups chopped cooked leftover turkey
1-pound of macaroni, I used Ziti¼ pound of butter
½ cup flour
1-teaspoon of seasoning salt, such as Lawry's. I used Tony Chacherie's Creole Seasoning
2-cups milk
2-18.5 ounce cans of soup, I used
Progresso brand Bacon, Potato Soup but there is a wide variety
of these prepared soups to choose from.
1-2 cups grated cheese, I used mostly
Asiago with Parmesan directly on top but Mozzarella, Monterrey Jack
and Provolone would also be good.
Method:
Put on a pot of water to boil the
macaroni. When boiling, add a little salt and macaroni- Pre-heat oven to 350F/175C
- In a large saucepan, melt the butter on medium heat
- Heat the milk almost to boiling in microwave or stove-top saucepan
- Add the flour and seasoning to the butter, stir to combine, cook a minute or two
- Pour the hot milk into the flour/fat roux and stir to make a white sauce
- Drain the cooked macaroni
- Grease or spray non-stick on a 13inch by 9 inch baking pan
- Spread the macaroni in the pan
- Add most of the cheese to the white sauce and stir thoroughly. Reserve some cheese.
- Add the cans of soup to the cheese sauce and combine
- Pour into the macaroni and combine
- Place in middle of oven and bake 20-30 minutes
- Shut oven, turn on broiler
- Spread some grated cheese atop the casserole. Optionally, shake black pepper all over.
- Place under broiler a minute or so to make top golden.
And that is a wonderful way to deal
with leftover turkey. Quite frankly, if it wasn't for tradition, I
would serve turkey this way on Thanksgiving day, but of course it
wouldn't be the same, would it? But the
next day? Oy, what a treat. Deja vu never tasted so good.
