Its day 30 of being in lockdown / work from home / shelter in place… and we’re running out of recipe ideas! The strange thing is despite being at home, there isn’t enough time to actually cook fun interesting meals everyday. Most week, hubby and I would cook 2-3 times a week and order in or go out for the rest. Without that option now, its becoming seriously tough to come up with newer ways to please the palette!
Additionally, we’re also ordering food in a way where we only need to go to the grocery store once in 2-3 weeks. And this week I got bags of of chicken and frozen veggies 🙂 So i figured, instead of doing yet another chicken tikka masala, I’ll go another way – luckily, this turned out amazing!
Not only was this super flavorful, the quantities are huge so this would last my hubby and me at-least 2 full days of lunches & dinners – now that’s a meal-prep win for me! So here goes:
INGREDIENTS
1 lb chicken
1/2 onion
3 cups Bell Pepper strips
1 cup uncooked quinoa
1 cup water
1/3 cup Parmesan cheese
Marinade
Salt & Pepper
2 tbsp Garlic
1 tsp Red chilli powder (optional)
1 tsp Cumin powder (optional)
1 tsp Garlic powder (optional)
Creamy White Roux Sauce
1/2 cup flour (whole wheat)
2 cups Vegetable Broth
1/2 cup Milk (2%)
1 tbsp Butter
DIRECTIONS
Preheat the oven to 400F.
Cut up the chicken in small cubes
Marinate the chicken in all the “marinade” ingredients above and let it sit
To prepare the White Roux sauce:
Take a pot and put the butter and flour in. Turn it on Simmer.
Add 1/2 cup of milk and start stirring continuously
Add salt, pepper, garlic powder
(TIP: When you add flour to a hot liquid, it’ll get lumpy very quickly, so it needs to be stirred continuously)
Once the mixture starts to get thick, add 1 cup fo Vegetable broth and keep stirring
(TIP: If needed, take the pot off the heated stove to avoid lumps, and then put it back)
Once this gets creamy/thick, add another cup of Vegetable broth and keep stirring
Stir until the mixture is a slightly thick (not runny) sauce.
Once ready, add 1 cup of quinoa + 1 cup of water to the above mix
Stir till its all mixed / blended in (Add more salt & pepper if needed)
Casserole Layering:
Grease the casserole generously.
Chop onions.
Pour the above Quinoa & White Roux mix along with chopped onions into to the casserole dish
Spread the marinated chicken across the top (or mix it in so the marinate blends into the sauce – that’s what I did, but for better presentation, you can keep it on the top layer)
Spread in peppers across the top.
Sprinkle shredded cheese on top.
Place the dish in the oven (preheated to 400F) for 60 mins.
Check to see if the quinoa is cooked – if not, cook it for another 15 mins.
Bring it out and let it cook for 10 mins.
Garnish with some Rosemary & Thyme and SERVE!
Deb's Food Hacks 