{Homemade} Chicken-Broccoli Bake

I've had broccoli for a while (or been eating it off and on for a while) and wanted to make something with it. So I came up with this dish by what I had in the kitchen. Man was this good! I made a side of cornbread which went great with this! I must say that EVERYTHING that I made was homemade from scratch. That is right, nothing was out of a box. Except the noodles in the chicken bake dish.

Chicken Broccoli Bake with Cornbread

6 chicken tenders (or chicken breasts, however much you want or have)
2 cans cream of chicken soup (small)
2 cans of water (from the soup can)
1 head of broccoli, chopped
1 medium can diced green chilies
1/2 box or pound of elbow noodles, whole wheat (you can use whatever noodles you want)
salt and pepper to taste
garlic salt to taste

Preheat oven to 375 F. The chicken tenders I used were frozen, so I took those out at the very end and topped them on the rest just before putting in the oven. First, open the cans of soup and empty in a 9x13 inch casserole dish. I used just under 2 cans of water, mix this in. Next, add green chilies. These were not spicy at all, but gave it a great flavor! Mix in the chopped broccoli. Again, add more if you want/have it. Next, I added the noodles, uncooked. The added water will help cook these through. Last, add chicken, raw. I suppose you could pre-cook the chicken and it would be fine. But this worked out just fine for me, and I checked to make sure the chicken was cooked through. Salt, pepper and garlic salt to season the chicken to taste. I didn't use much of any seasoning. I mixed the noodles down just under the surface of the liquids to help cook the noodles, and pushed down the chicken so it would help cook them too. Put in the oven for 50-60 minutes. I checked at 45 minutes and turned the chicken over to make sure it cooked thurough.

This turned out perfect! Seriously, the broccoli with the green chilies and soup mixture had such a great flavor, and the added noodles gave it some more filling. Of course the chicken was good too!

On to the Cornbread.

1 cup flour
1 cup yellow cornmeal
1/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg, beaten
1 cup sour cream
1/3 cup milk
1/4 cup melted butter
**bonus: 2 tablespoons honey

Preheat oven to 400 F. Combine all the dry ingredients. Combine the egg, sour cream, milk and butter and stir into the dry ingredients. I didn't use an electric mixer, it was pretty simple to mix with very little effort. Add in honey at last, and by all means add a bit more if you like. I noticed that the 2  tablespoons I added didn't quite give it the "honey" flavor once baked, but you could tell it was there. Pour batter into a greased 8x8 inch baking dish. Bake for 20-25 minutes. Ta-da!

This whole meal was GREAT. While it took a little time to make, a little longer than some of the dishes I've made, it was worth it. Really tasted like a great home cooked meal. And the left overs? Won't last long...as we're having this for lunch today as I speak.

Happy Weekend!