Chicken Spaghetti-Another Comfort Food Favorite

Chicken spaghetti is a recipe I had never heard of until it popped up on my radar just after we moved to our place in New Mexico. It's one of those Texas recipes, I guess, because I recently internet searched for chicken spaghetti and Texas, and found many versions of this comfort food casserole.

Ree Drummond of The Pioneer Woman fame, has an excellent chicken spaghetti recipe on her website and it's hers I tried first. It's still my go-to recipe for guests, creamy and savory, with just a little spicy bite at the finish.

Last week, though, I needed to take a main dish to the Sangre de Cristo Livestock Growers' monthly meeting and couldn't get to a grocery store. In the fridge was half a rotisserie chicken and in the freezer were two broiled chicken breasts.  I had cream of mushroom soup and there was half a block of Velveeta cheese food. I was good to go.

It isn't as good as Ree Drummond's Chicken Spaghetti, but it worked well enough that someone at the meeting asked, "Is that an Alfredo sauce in there?" And I answered, "Yes, Campbell's Alfredo."

Ro-Tel Chicken Spaghetti (Serves 6-8)

Ingredients

12 ounces spaghetti, cooked and drained
2 cups cooked chicken, chopped
1 can cream of mushroom or cream of chicken soup
1 can Ro-tel tomatoes (I used medium spiciness)
1 can chicken broth
1 lb Velveeta cheese, cubed

Directions

1. Boil water and cook your spaghetti. Drain your spaghetti into a colander and leave it there while you do the next step.

2. Mix the chicken, soup, tomatoes, and chicken broth in the pan you used to cook the spaghetti.

3. Add the spaghetti and cubed cheese. Mix that baby up so the cheese cubes are well distributed within the mixture.

4. Put a little olive oil on a paper towel square and grease a 13 by 9 inch pan. Or spray it with your oil stuff. Pour the spaghetti mixture into the pan.

5. Cover with foil and bake at 350 degrees for 30 to 45 minutes until it's warm and bubbly. You can take the cover off the last 15 minutes if you like a little browning on the top.

6. When you take the pan out of the oven, give it a stir to ensure the cheese is evenly distributed.

Sadly, there are usually no leftovers.