Chicken and Brown Rice Casserole with Broccoli

You know the only reason I posted the potstickers is because I made another blog-worthy dish and I felt bad posting it before giving the dumplings some love? :)

However, now that the chicken potstickers have had their 15 minutes of fame, the next cool thing ready to come to town!

Plus, this one is healthier and easier!

Ingredients

• 1 rotisserie chicken
• 1 crown of broccoli
• 1 cup of brown rice
• 1 tbsp butter
• 1/4 small onion, chopped
• 2 tbsp flour
• 1.5 cups of chicken stock
• 1/3 cup of heavy whipping cream
• salt, to taste (or 2 tsp)
• freshly ground pepper, to taste (about like 4 grinds if you have a pepper mill…that’s what they’re called, right?)
• 1 tsp crushed red pepper
• 1 tsp chili powder
• 1 tbsp garlic powder
• 1 tbsp oregano
• 1.5 cups bread crumb mix (1 cup Italian bread crumbs, 1/2 cup panko bread crumbs, and 1 tbsp oregano mixed together)

Process

Step 1: Take the meat of the rotisserie chicken off the bone.

Step 2: Chop up your crown of broccoli into small florets.

They don't really cook fully in the baking process (and I learned that the hard way), so you have to either sauté them briefly on a pan or just put them in a glass bowl, add a tbsp of water, cover it with a wet paper towel or a small ceramic plate or something and microwave them for 2:30 minutes. The steam will accumulate so be careful taking it out and removing the plate lid.

Step 3: Cook your brown rice, according to instructions on the bag.  (I did 1 cup of rice and 2 cups of water in a rice cooker and it was perfect.)

See? Look how perfect it looks.

Baby Step 4: Preheat your oven to 350 degrees.

Step 5: Now, melt the butter in a pan on low heat. I used a cast iron one, but I don’t really know if that made any difference.  Once it’s melted, add the finely chopped onions in there and let them cook up a bit.

Steps 6 and 7: Once they start to brown (it’ll be pretty quickly), throw in 1 tbsp of flour and mix it in to make the roux.  Then add 1 cup of chicken stock and start to whisk it.  Add in the rest of the flour, the rest of the chicken stock, and the heavy whipping cream.  It’s important to keep whisking and make sure that it’s all blended together!  This is a pretty quick process and you’ll see it thicken right before your eyes.

Step 8: Add the salt, pepper, crushed red pepper, chili powder, garlic powder, and oregano to the mix and stir it all up.

If you want to make it a cheesy chicken and brown rice casserole, then this would be a good time to put in about a cup of cheese and stir it into the roux.

Step 9: Next step is to mix the rotisserie chicken, the brown rice, the creamy roux, and the broccoli together.

I folded in the broccoli florets at the very end (after mixing the first three together) because I’ve noticed that broccoli tends to get mushy if you mix too much. (You can choose to keep a bit of the roux to drizzle on the top if you choose to.  I found that that’s a good idea to make the leftovers tasty and creamier.)

Step 10: Now put the mix into a casserole dish and top with your bread crumb mix and if you want, grate some cheese on top.

Step 11: Then bake for 15 minutes, and ta-da! Time for some om nom nomz.