Cheesy Chicken Noodle Casserole

Cheap, quick, and easy. Ah, yes. My FAVORITE kind of recipe. You know what makes it even better? It tastes good! I got the idea for this from my mom, who got it from my aunt, who got it from....somewhere else...? It was actually a side dish involving frozen, diced, hashbrown potatoes and it's always the first thing to go empty at potlucks and parties. Just as popular with kids as it is with adults! That's another plus. I liked it so much, I decided to put my own spin on it.

Cheesy Chicken Noodle Casserole

Ingredients

1 stick of butter, softened OR melted

16 oz. sour cream

16 oz. condensed cream of chicken soup (one "family size" can)

2 cans of chunk chicken (10 oz. each)

12 oz. wide ribbon noodles

1 cup shredded cheddar cheese (or as much as you like!)

Directions

(1) Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.

(2) In a large bowl, stir together butter, sour cream, soup, and chicken.

(3) Carefully fold in the noodles until completely covered with the wet mixture. Pour/scrape into a 9x13 cake pan/baking dish and cover with foil.

(4) Bake for 45 minutes COVERED with foil. When finished, uncover and sprinkle on the shredded cheese. Bake an additional 5-10 minutes UNcovered until cheese is melted.

(2)

 (3)

 Finished Product

This is a great meal if you don't have a whole lot of extra time for prep and maybe need another family member to pop it into the oven for you. Example: I mixed this up last night, stored it in the fridge overnight, then had my wonderful husband put it in the oven about 30 minutes before Alexa and I got home today. 

**NOTE: If you do store it in the fridge overnight, add about 10-15 minutes to the bake time!

Oh, and this re-heats in the microwave really well. Yet ANOTHER plus!

Other variations:

**A. Take out the chicken and noodles, substitute a bag of frozen, diced, hash brown potatoes and you've got an awesome side dish! (the original "recipe" this was derived from)

**B. Use fresh/frozen chicken. I use canned because it's cheaper, quicker, and easier and we like it. If you don't like canned, get a pound of fresh/frozen chicken, cook it, dice or shred it, and substitute.