Chicken Divan

Here is another recipe I grew up with. My family used to call it Chicken Diane, and maybe that is why I liked it so much. If you are trying to get your kids to try curry, this is a recipe that eases them into it since it only has 1/2 tsp curry powder in the sauce. We had this tonight and Reagan told me "Mommy, I love this!" She ate her serving and Chase's serving (since anything that does not resemble pizza is not worthy of his notice). My mom served this with broccoli cut into large spears and big pieces of chicken on a platter, but since I have smaller children I cut the chicken and broccoli into smaller pieces and assemble it more like a casserole. I serve this with rice, but I have heard some eat Chicken Divan with egg noodles.

Chicken Divan

3-4 chicken breasts

1-2 broccoli heads (depends on size)

1 can cream of chicken soup

1/2 cup mayonnaise

1/2 tsp lemon juice

1/2 tsp curry powder

1 cup grated cheddar cheese

breadcrumbs (optional)

Cook the chicken breasts. Cool and cut into chunks. Cook broccoli until just done. I put the chicken and broccoli together in a 9x9 or 13x9 pan. Stir together the cream of chicken, mayo, lemon juice and curry powder and pour over the chicken and broccoli. Top with the cheese and put into the oven at 350 degrees for 25 minutes.

My take: I make dishes a lot that call for pre-cooked, cut-up chicken like this one. I will try to cook a large amount of chicken breasts ahead of time, cut them up and freeze them. Since this is my least favorite part of the recipe, it is nice to have it already done. I cook thawed chicken breasts in the oven at 400 degrees for 20 minutes. In this recipe, I steam the broccoli, but I am sure you could microwave it as well. I also sometimes mix in pureed veggies like cauliflower with Chicken Divan, but I find it just doesn't work as well as some other recipes since the sauce is supposed to be thick.