Deep Dish Chicken Pot Pie [Recipe]

It's fall y'all (aka my favorite time of year). And with the cooler temperatures comes comfort food. On Friday night when our desert temps dipped to 60 degrees, I decided to dust off my deep dish chicken pot pie recipe I found several years ago from Kraft. It's simple, looks fancy and I'm pretty positive you'll love it. I always forget how much I enjoy this dish.

I made a few slight variations to the original recipe and here's how.

WHAT YOU NEED

• 1 lb. chicken breasts, cut into bite-size pieces
• 1/4 cup KRAFT Lite Zesty Italian Dressing
• 4 oz. Neufchatel Cheese, cubed
• 2 Tbsp. flour
• 1/2 cup fat-free reduced-sodium chicken broth
• 3 cups frozen mixed vegetables
• 2 Tbsp. unsalted butter (optional)
• Salt, pepper & parsley to taste (optional)
• 1 ready-to-use frozen pie crust
• Egg wash (one egg + 2 Tbsp water)

Sautee veges in 2 Tbsp. of butter over medium low heat to soften. In a separate skillet, cook chicken in dressing in large skillet on medium heat 2 min. Add cream cheese; cook and stir until melted. Add flour; mix well. Add broth and vegetables; simmer 5 min. 

After you pour mixture into deep dish 10-inch pie plate, arrange pie crust over filling and flute edges. Cut slits in crust to allow steam to escape. Brush pie with egg wash. Bake 25-30 min. or until crust is golden brown.

The cream cheese is the secret. Enjoy.

I've decided to meal plan and I hate thieves.

In an attempt to be more organized, eat out less and save money, I've decided to give this whole meal planning thing a whirl.  I make no promises, but I am going to give it the ole' college try this week and see how my checking account and waist line like it.

Here is what is on the menu at Casa de Bargain Blonde this week.

Monday (yesterday) - Chicken and Rice Casserole

This is my absolute favorite meal in the whole wide world and only 4 ingredients (rice, chicken, cream of mushroom, black olives). Sounds sick, but it's my fave.  

Tuesday  - Baked Mushroom Pork Chops 

Recipe adapted from All Recipes

Wednesday - Texan Ranch Casserole

via Taste of Home

Thursday - Lia Joy's Chicken Spaghetti

via Lia Joy's blog Life is aMAYESing - However, I plan on using reduced fat cheese and using it sparingly. Still trying to lose weight, folks.

Friday - Leftovers

Let's not kid ourselves completely. I highly doubt I'll be cooking meals on Friday nights, so leftovers it is. Any avid meal planners out there that can share their tricks of the trade?  Please leave any meal planning advice in the comments. 

In some shocking and sad news, I got a call from my Mom this morning who is away on business telling me burglars broke into her house last night.  My first question was, "Where is Nicky (my cat)?"  Turns out, he has yet to be located which breaks my heart.  I really, really, really hope he is hiding in a closet or under the bed because if not ... well, I don't even want to think about it.  

The police were at her house last I checked taking finger prints and the likes. The scumbags who broke in stole some electronics, a box of my blank checks (awesome), etc.  I really don't understand people. Why would someone do this? Get a job and don't steal from people who work hard for their money. 

FIND NICKY!

My cat, Nicky, and a baby Reesey.  Melt my heart. 

Please keep Nicky in your thoughts. I want him home safe.

My Weekend via Instagram (Baked Veggie Egg White Recipe included)

I honestly don't ever use my real camera anymore. The only photos I take are on my iPhone and then 99% of the time, they get Instagramed. BTW - I have over 1,000 Instagram followers. How did this happen?  I have no Earthly idea, but it excites me.

Friday night I saw the magical Magic Mike movie.  It was everything I dreamed about and more.  Our theater was so crazy. We were slow clapping, cheering and screaming. I loved it and felt like I was back at Thunder From Down Under.  If you haven't seen it yet, grab your besties and go immed.

The theater now sells booze and I'm not complaining. 

My BFF Liz and my gubby came with!  And my bros gf but she missed the photo sesh before the movie started.

Saturday morning my college gf Amber hosted a Stella and Dot party for me.  She has the cutest studio apartment I've ever seen. I wish I could take y'all for a tour.

Saturday evening I went to HomeGoods (exciting life) and got a new centerpiece for my dining room table. It was a Cynthia Rowley vase I found on clearance for only $10. The arrangement I put in it was also on clearance for only $10.  All in all, I thought my $20 centerpiece looked pretty good.

Then Sunday morning, Bear did this:

Y'all. I was so mad I could have killed him. I took him by the collar and put him outside for punishment.  He knew he was in trouble!  I swear I am living the real life Marley and Me with this dog.  He is so wild.

After my anger subsided, I took him to the pool with me and let him swim while I drank my coffee and caught up on my mags.

Saturday before I went shopping, I stopped at Which Wich for dinner.  To my surprise, they now have bowls aka salads and I got the Mediterranean Turkey Bowl.  It was so good. Yes, the lady went overkill on my pepper.  I love pepper though so I didn't mind.  And can we talk about banana peppers?  They may be my new favorite thing.

I loved it so much, I made my own version of a Greek salad for lunch Sunday. Spring lettuce, cucumbers (how cute are my flower cucumbers?), grape tomatoes, turkey, Kalamata olives (I die), a little bit of crumbled Feta and Parmesan garlic dressing.

I also made this deelish egg white bake on Sunday for breakfast.  I loved it so much that I'm sharing the recipe. I paired it with a toasted piece of 45 cal Sara Lee 100% whole wheat bread and 1/2 C of watermelon. Now that's what I call brunch.

I adapted a recipe I found on SkinnyTaste and here is how I made it.  It's super easy.

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees
2. Chop about 1/8 C of green and white onion. Spray a small skillet with non-fat cooking spray and heat the onions over med-low heat for a few minutes.

3. Add 1/2 C of baby spinach (large stems removed) to skillet and cook until the spinach wilts. 

4. Spray a small glass baking dish or a skillet with non-fat cooking spray (my preference is the olive oil version) and put the spinach/onion mixture on the bottom.  Next crack 3 eggs whites on top of the spinach and onion.  Add a few tomatoes to the top and salt and pepper.  


5. Bake for 17 minutes and you are done!  A  clean, all-natural and delicious breakfast. Vegetarian friendly, too!

P.S. I'm linking up with S, D and L!

What I've been eating since starting Tone It Up

Today we talk food because honestly, who doesn't love to stuff their face?  If you don't, we can't be friends because I like to get down with some food.  I refuse to starve myself with gross, tasteless food, so I've found some delicious, healthy meals to help me reach my weight loss goals.


This post has all the meals I've eaten so far on this plan and they are all yummy in my tummy!  The name of each recipe links to the recipe video or web page.  As always, let me know if you have questions. I'm happy to answer!

The Tone It Up Protein Pancake with all natural honey drizzled on top.

I normally don't eat the yogurt with the protein pancake (like in the pic above), but on Saturday I just combined my breakfast and my mid-morning snack as one meal.

Normally mid morning I have 1/2 C of non-fat Greek yogurt and 1/4 cup of bluberries.  I measure it the night before so it's easy to grab out of the fridge in the morning to take to work.  If you need a crunch with your yogurt, add a sprinkle of granola or almond slivers. Goodness, granola is good.

This is my absolute favorite Tone It Up (TIU) meal and it's what I've been eating for lunch this week.  What we have here is the TIU member-submitted Black Bean Tostada recipe, but I use the Ezekiel Sprouted Grain Tortillas (bake at 350 for 10 minutes, flip over and bake another 10 to get the tortilla crispy).  I also add nitrate-free chicken slices chopped up.

If I don't eat the tostada for lunch, I'll have a big salad with low sodium turkey from my local deli, lots of veggies and balsalmic vinaigrette as the dressing.

The easiest thing for me to do as an afternoon snack is a Luna protein bar and the S'mores variety is my fave flavor!  The ThinkThin and Lara bars are some of the TIU girl's favorites.  I'll drink some Green Tea with it if I'm feeling frisky.

For dinner I've switched between ground turkey and quinoa (pronounced keen-wa), chicken or tilapia with veggies or a side salad.

Mrs. Dash skillet baked chicken and baked green beans flavored with Mrs. Dash.  Mrs. Dash is salt-free and a fave of the TIU girls. 

I grilled chicken kabobs on the grill with veggies last Saturday. I just marinated the chicken with a healthy oil-based dressing for a few hours in the fridge, cut it up and added chicken and sliced veges to kabob sticks.  I also grilled green beans and mushrooms in a foil packed with a little olive oil and Mrs. Dash.  Easy and good!

Zesty Tilapia and mushrooms!  The recipe calls for some dried mushroom I've never heard of and didn't care to look up, so I just use regular button mushrooms and it's deelish.  This tilapia is SO easy and SO GOOD. Seriously, out of this world.  The recipe also calls for butter, so use olive oil instead.  

Quinoa (keen-wa) and ground turkey stuffed tomatoes. I kinda made the recipe up so if you don't love it, sorry!  Preheat oven to 350.  Cut the tops off of 8 to 10 large red tomatoes and scoop the insides out.  Brown 1 lb of lean ground turkey with mushrooms, chopped onion and minced garlic.  Add 2 low-sodium taco seasoning packets to flavor the turkey once it's browned (I used an all-natural seasoning packed I found).  While your ground turkey is browning, cook one cup of quinoa according to package instructions.   Combine the quinoa and ground turkey.  Place the tomatoes in a glass caseerole dish and fill with the mixture. Add about a 1/2 inch of water to the bottom of the casserole dish (steams the mushrooms while baking).  Bake at 350 for 25 minutes. If you want to add cheese to the tops, take out 5 minutes early, sprinkle cheese and bake the last 5 minutes. I don't eat dairy in the evening so I don't use cheese, but it's a good addition. 

If you are like, "What the hizzle is quinoa?", don't fret. I didn't know what it was either, but it is cooked just like rice, but it is actually a seed and not a grain.  It's super healthy for you and the TIU girls highly recommend it on the diet plan.

Your turn.  What are your favorite healthy meals?! Share them below.


p.s. I WILL have Friday Favorites tomorrow and you can link-up.