March 27th, 2007 - Universal hotdish

[updated; all amounts are correct]

I have always loved hotdish (called casserole in other parts of the country, but I’m Minnesotan at heart, and it’s called hotdish there), but rarely make any. This past week, I made not one but two! Eric accidently made 2# of pasta about a week ago, and it was his least favorite shape. So I volunteered making hotdish. It was so yummy I made another one Saturday.

I used the universal hotdish recipe from Tightwad Gazette, which is now written on a recipe card so I don’t have to hunt for it (listed under recipes: universal). I doubled the recipe as that’s what fits in our casserole dish.

2 cups main ingredient (she says meat, but both of ours were vegetarian)
2 cups second ingredient (usually a vegetable)
2-4 cups starch (rice, potatoes, pasta)
3 cups binder (cream soup, spaghetti sauce, white sauce/variations)
1 cup “extras” optional (water chestnuts, almonds, pimentos)
topping optional (cheese, chips, breadcrumbs, etc.)
if too dry, add a little water or milk
seasoning to taste

Bake 30-45 minutes at 350.

The first was a homemade garlic/herb/cheese sauce with mixed veggies, topped with breadcrumbs in melted butter. This took at least 45 minutes after preheating. I didn’t add any seasonings other than the garlic and basicl in the sauce.

The second was a taco hotdish with cheese sauce and sour cream for the binder (with a couple teaspoons of chili powder for seasoning), some forgotten salsa one ingredient and corn for the other. I didn’t measure. I just put in what looked good! I topped it with crushed blue corn chips that had been forgotten in the pantry. This one was juicer than the first, but still held together well. I made this in the morning and cooked it in the afternoon. Since the container was cold, I put it in the oven during preheating. I put it in for 45 minutes total and it was definitely DONE at 45 minutes to my surprise. Maggie and I added more chips in before eating, since there were still some in the bag (Eric’s not big on crunchy things as toppings or I would have put them all on before cooking; I also wasn’t sure they wouldn’t burn).

Both times I made a sauce from the Better Homes & Garden cookbook (doubled). It was amazingly easy! The recipe includes half a dozen variations, two of which I combined for the first hotdish. Counting making the sauce, it probably took less than 20 minutes to prep start to finish, with pasta cooked days earlier. This is just like my fruit bread machine recipe–basic ingredients, modify depending on what you want to make/have on hand. I’m excited to make more of these. Or, well, to let Eric do it. This is our kind of easy recipe.

Oh, and unlike other experimental recipes I’ve tried, we ALL liked both hotdishes!

This entry was posted on Tuesday, March 27th, 2007 at 12:09 pm EDT and is filed under Food. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

One Response to “Universal hotdish”

  1. Megan Crow Says:
    March 27th, 2007 at 1:48 pm EDT

    I can’t remember when I linked to you…it was probably in one of my “round-ups” which you can see by clicking on my round-ups category…but anyway, yes I was very excited when I started reading your blog - and then you referenced something to Oshkosh and I realized you lived in the same area!

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