In this episode of Cooking from Food Storage, I make Chicken Basil from the book, 100 Day Pantry by Jan Jackson. This recipe uses 100% shelf stable items. The idea behind this book is that you don’t even need water to make the recipes, even if cooking pasta and rice. Without further ado, let’s get into how to make Chicken Basil, from shelf stable ingredients.
Cooking from Food Storage | Chicken Basil
Ingredients
First, let’s take a look at the ingredients:
- 6 oz pasta (I used egg noodles)
- 1 14-oz can of chicken broth
- 1 12.5-oz can of chicken
- 1 15-oz can carrots, drained (I used a pint of my home-canned carrots that I did NOT drain.)
- 1 6-oz can mushrooms, undrained, optional
- 1 16-oz jar Alfredo sauce
- 1/2 cup dried broccoli
- 1 tablespoon dried basil
- Salt and pepper to taste
Directions (as they are given in the book)
Cook the noodles in the chicken broth, until the noodles are done. Add the other ingredients and simmer until heated through.
Directions – What I Actually Did
My original intention was to follow the recipe exactly as written. However, as I looked at the instructions, I noticed that there weren’t any instructions for rehydrating the broccoli. This would work okay, if you used crumbled up broccoli that was very fine, almost powdered. But I wanted some big chunks of broccoli, and I was concerned they wouldn’t rehydrate properly if I only heated them through.
Rehydrating the Broccoli while Cooking the Noodles
I started off by putting the noodles and broth into the pan.I ended up deciding to rehydrate the broccoli while I was cooking the noodles.
My only concern with that was that the can of broth may not be enough to cook the noodles AND rehydrate the broccoli. So I decided to drain the liquid from my home-canned carrots into the pot with the broth, so I’d be sure to have enough liquid to both cook the noodles and rehydrate the broccoli
I added the liquid from the carrots to the broth so that I’d have enough liquid to cook the noodles AND rehydrate the broccoli.
I simmered the dehydrated broccoli in with the noodles.Add Remaining Ingredients and Heat Through
Once the noodles were cooked and the broccoli was rehydrated, I added the remaining ingredients and heated through. It turned out more soupy than I anticipated.
This turned out to be more like a soup than a casserole, but it was a delicious way to use food from my pantry.This could be because I used the liquid from the carrots, but it’s also possible that it was supposed to be soupy. Regardless of whether or not it had more liquid than intended, it was delicious, and I plan to make it again.
Cost:
- Chicken broth – $0.50
- Chicken – $2.08
- Mushrooms – $0.88
- Canned carrots – $0.50
- Alfredo sauce – $1.50
- Broccoli – $0.37
- Noodles – 8.9 cents per ounce x 6 ounces = 54 cents
100 Day Pantry review [Video]How to Dehydrate Broccoli [Video]100 Day Pantry [Book]
