Tuna Casserole

Tomorrows post...today!

I had this on the calendar for our menu plan. I never bought, nor intended to buy, a box mix. That was fine until today when I set out to make it and also didn't have a recipe. Boxes are good for those. I relied on canned and dried food which makes this a pantry meal except for the butter and milk, unless you make your own. There are more than a couple of ingredients but not a lot of prep work and fairly simple directions. Here is my take on a Tuna Casserole. I tried to health it up a bit.

Ingredients

1lb eggless noodles
1/4- 1/2 cup dried onions
1 can salt free (sf) cream of something soup
1 can sf sweet peas
1 can sf jullien cut carrots
1.5 cups room temp milk
2 tbs butter plus more for topping
2 tbs whole wheat flour
2 tbs some kind of boullion
2 cans chunked tuna (you could also sub. chicken)
2 cups shredded white cheddar (using that Amish cheese again!)
pepper to taste
1 cup breadcrumbs
Nutritional Yeast

Directions

-Preheat oven to 375. Set a large pot with water to boil for the pasta, add boullion and onion to the water. When it boils, add the pasta.

-While the water is heating, get a medium sauce pan and melt the butter in it. Stir in the flour. Add the warmed milk. Wisk that together and cook for 10 minutes. Wisk in the cream of soup and tuna, add pepper to taste.

-Drain the pasta and onions just before al dente -or fully cooked- and pour into a 9x13 or larger casserole pan.

-Add the cream tuna sauce, peas and carrots to the pan and stir it all up really well.

-Sprinkle the top with the cheese and breadcrumbs. Add tiny pats of butter to the top.

-Bake for 35 min.

-Serve in a bowl with a nice sprinkling of nutritional yeast.

This filled my casserole pan and is quite hearty. This single dish will more than feed the seven of us (yep, even Max had a good bit). I hope to get more sustaining and use peas and carrots, milk and butter from our farm when we have it. Perhaps grind our own flour, fish the tuna and make the cheese. I already did well with the onions and breadcrumbs.

Baby steps and good food. That's what this is about.