How comforting is this? Chicken Pot Pie with Bacon-and-Cheddar Biscuits. Wow!

I could tell that the Chicken Pot Pie with Bacon-and-Cheddar Biscuits was labor-intensive (i.e, lots of chopping, mainly). Who but Hubby would be more interested in the outcome? After all, Chicken Pot Pie is his favorite dish. So I humored him a little and promised that I’d mention his name in my blog today if he’d be willing to help a little in the kitchen. He rose to the bait!

Boy, was he glad he did! Many minutes later (every vegetable in the produce department, practically, went into the mix) he was dining on this steamy, savory comfort-food dish with its tasty bacon-cheddar topping and tossing out enough superlatives to fill a dictionary. Wow!

Southern Living (January 2012 issue) really outdid itself with its section of shortcut chicken suppers, which included this recipe. The magazine recommends using grocery deli chicken to speed things along, but I boiled some chicken breasts so I’d have the homemade (and salt-free) broth to go along with them. The recipe called for Creole seasoning; I didn’t have this but did have Mrs. Dash chicken grilling seasoning that I subbed. It was excellent. Fresh parsley for the Chicken Pie Filling and fresh chives for the biscuits really livened things up.

Hands-on time: 50 minutes, the recipe says. Having a buddy in the kitchen really helped speed this up. Best of all, the recipe, baked in a 13-inch-by-9-inch dish, will last us the rest of the week (6-to-8 servings, says the list of instructions). I know that this little meal will only get better as the week progresses.

Chicken Pie Filling

1/3 cup butter

1/3 cup all-purpose flour

1 1/2 cups chicken broth

1 1/2 cups milk (I used skim)

1 1/2 teaspoons Creole seasoning

2 tablespoons butter

1 large sweet onion, diced

1 (8-ounce) package sliced fresh mushrooms

4 cups shredded cooked chicken

2 cups frozen cubed hash browns

1 cup matchstick carrots

1 cup frozen small sweet peas

1/3 cup chopped fresh parsley

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Melt 1/3 cup butter in a large saucepan over medium heat; add flour and cook, whisking constantly, for 1 minute. Gradually add chicken broth and milk and cook, whisking constantly, for 6 to 7 minutes or until thickened and bubbly. Remove from heat and stir in Creole seasoning. Set aside. Melt 2 tablespoons butter in a large Dutch oven over medium-high heat; add onion and mushrooms and sauté 10 minutes or until tender. Stir in chicken, next 4 ingredients, and sauce. Then prepare topping as instructed below.

Bacon-and-Cheddar Biscuits (topping)

Spoon chicken filling into a lightly greased 13-by-9-inch baking dish. In separate bowl cut 1/2 cup cold butter into 1/2-inch cubes. Cut butter cubes into 2 cups self-rising flour with a pastry blender or fork until mixture is crumbly and resembles small peas. Add 3/4 cup shredded sharp Cheddar cheese, 1/4 cup finely chopped cooked bacon (I used turkey bacon), 2 tablespoons chopped fresh chives, and 1 cup whipping cream (I used skim milk). Stir just until dry ingredients are moistened. Turn dough out onto a lightly floured surface and knead lightly 3 or 4 times. Roll or pat dough to 3/4-inch thickness; cut with a 2 1/2-inch round cutter to form 15 biscuits. (I skipped this rolling step and simply spooned 15 big tablespoons of batter onto the top of the chicken mixture. When baked my topping looked just like the one in the magazine and saved me the trouble of the pastry-roll step—and the cleanup.) Bake Chicken Pie Filling at 425 degrees for 15 minutes. Remove from oven and arrange biscuits on top of hot chicken mixture. Bake 25 to 30 more minutes or until biscuits are golden brown and chicken mixture is bubbly. Remove from oven; brush biscuits with 2 tablespoons melted butter. Makes 6 to 8 servings.

Hearty mix of flavors and the arrival of company--this veggie soup is synonymous with both

Company arrival and the preparation of Easy Vegetable Soup--they seem to accompany each other like the moon and the stars.

That's how I first got onto this delightful and welcome soup, which bespeaks of comfort food and health and hearty flavors. I was getting ready for company--not just any company, but the very first visit of my birthfamily to Texas. This happened more than 30 years ago, when I had the good fortune to locate my birthmother and her husband, who wanted to travel to see us. They brought with them my birth sister and her fiance. What an amazing time we had! Although this visit happened in the middle of summer, this most fall-like dish was a joyful accompaniment and always will be remembered for that momentous time.

Now my kitchen's the scene of much busy hubbub as we anticipate another red-letter visit--the arrival of our kids from Arizona to meet our newest family member, that sweet grandson who was born in Texas just a few weeks ago. Three little cousins, all under 5, will have their first chance to play. Into the kettle on the stove again go the familiar ingredients for this scrumptious dish, which I want to have on hand to welcome our guests. Healthy, soothing vegetable soup seems to be a great first meal to serve once they arrive from their plane flight.

For the frozen veggies in the recipe, I rely on an airtight plastic bowl I keep in my freezer. After a meal, if I have any vegetable leftovers, I scoop them into the bowl and freeze them. When I'm preparing Easy Vegetable Soup, I already have my frozen veggies collected for it--a great way to recycle.

My hands can hardly grasp the utensils because I'm so jittery from excitement, but somehow I manage to get the dish put together and put away for our welcome time a few days hence. At least I can relax in knowing that a healthy dinner already is prepared and that I won't have to spend precious family moments slaving away in the kitchen over a meal. Thanks to Easy Vegetable Soup, a most healthy and colorful one awaits!

Easy Vegetable Soup

1 pound ground beef or ground turkey

1 cup chopped onion

1/8 teaspoon garlic powder

1 cup sliced carrots

1 cup sliced celery

1/4 cup uncooked regular rice

2 (16-ounce) cans stewed tomatoes

3 1/2 cups water

5 beef bouillon cubes

1 tablespoon parsley flakes

1 teaspoon salt (I use salt substitute)

1/4 teaspoon basil

1/8 teaspoon pepper

1 cup frozen mixed vegetables, unthawed

1 (10 3/4 ounce) can low-sodium tomato soup

Cook ground beef or turkey; drain fat. Add all ingredients except frozen vegetables and tomato soup. Cook covered for 40 minutes. Add frozen vegetables and tomato soup. Cook additional 10 minutes. Serves 10-12.

A healthy, tasty dinner from veggies left in the refrigerator, freezer, and garden

We're not sure who Kathy is, but we'd sure like to thank her from the bottom of our hearts.

Her recipe, entitled "Kathy's Stir Fry", certainly delivered up for us a delicious dinner that was one of the biggest potpourris of garden veggies I've ever experienced.

And the best part about it was the line on the recipe, "Any vegetable may be omitted or substituted as desired."

That gave me a green light to look in my refrigerator and see what veggies were about to be on their last leg if I didn't use them soon. Solution: since Kathy says this is OK, I simply pull them off the shelves, chop, and stir in.

So, at the place in which she said to add asparagus, I subbed carrots, plus I threw in some chopped celery that was close to looking on the haggard side. Instead of regular onion I threw in the remainder of a red onion that was about to go limp on me. How virtuous I felt to be able to perform these rescue operations! Her recipe even called for 3/4 cup of frozen green peas (a recent Prevention magazine discussed the health benefits of frozen veggies and urged us not to be such "fresh" purists that we disregard the frozen-food aisle, especially when a shopper is pinching pennies.) I was happy to toss in those green peas, whose shelf life soon would be questionable as well.

"Kathy's Stir Fry" was one of my recipes from the Chickasaw Nutrition Services (I've just about made my way through cooking my latest collection of these treasured recipe cards that I obtain any time my hubby, a citizen of the Chickasaw Nation (tribe), visits Ardmore, OK, for a health exam. I look forward to another trip to Ardmore a few weeks from now so I can round up a few new cooking ideas.)

The Chickasaws are absolutely DETERMINED to improve the health conditions of their people--to reverse a downward spiral into diabetes, obesity, and other woes (that plague the general U.S. population as well.) These handy recipe cards the Chickasaw's Nutrition Services centers make available free to their people underscore the message over and over again: you CAN cook for your family the fresh way; you CAN make perfectly wonderful meals without adding things that cause ills. (For example, unlike a typical stir-fry recipe, "Kathy's Stir Fry" was amazingly good without the addition of any soy sauce, which usually boosts the sodium content of a recipe sky-high.)

The nutrition information for "Kathy's Stir Fry" read: 80 calories, 3 g fat, 0 mg cholesterol, 45 g sodium, 10 g carbohydrates, 3 g fiber. You can't beat that! (Serving the stir-fried veggies over brown rice, which the recipe suggests, alters those counts a little but adds some wonderful fiber to an already fiber-ific menu item.)

Most fun of all, the requested 3 cups of cabbage gave me a reason for traipsing out to my garden, cutting off a fresh cabbage head, and instantly adding it to the sizzling skillet for last night's dinner. When a meal necessitates that kind of activity, the joy of gardening and growing one's own food is complete. My hubby, on the road yesterday for an errand, returned home to lift the lid on the skillet and find a colorful melange of edible health just waiting for him.

Thank you, Kathy. Wherever--and whoever--you are, keep up the good work. I hope to see your name on some more of my Chickasaw recipe cards in the near future.

Kathy's Stir Fry

2 tablespoons olive oil

3/4 cup onion, diced

1/2 cup red bell pepper, diced

1/2 cup green bell pepper, diced

2 1/2 cups zucchini, sliced

2 1/2 cups yellow squash, sliced

2 cups broccoli

1 1/2 cups asparagus, fresh, sliced

2 teaspoons oregano

1/2 teaspoon black pepper

1/2 teaspoon cayenne pepper

2 garlic cloves, minced

3/4 cup green peas, frozen

Heat nonstick skillet on high heat until skillet is hot. Add 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Saute onions and red and green bell peppers for about 2 minutes. Add zucchini and squash; cook about 2 more minutes. Add broccoli, asparagus, and cabbage to skillet. Add oregano, black pepper, cayenne pepper, and garlic to vegetables. Continue to cook until broccoli is crisp-tender (about 4 minutes). Add peas. May be served with whole-grain (brown) rice. Makes 10 1-cup servings.