Recipe Background
Eating healthy shouldn't fill you with dread. It should fill you with joy at the prospect of eating exciting (yes, exciting!) new dishes like this Healthy Chicken Broccoli Bake! Imagine it: tender pasta, beefy mushrooms, juicy chicken, and garden-fresh broccoli in a lovely cream sauce and of course, with plenty of cheese. But now you don't have to imagine it! You can fire up the oven and enjoy the Healthy Chicken Broccoli Bake without guilt. In fact, it tastes even better than you can imagine!
Eating healthy shouldn't fill you with dread. It should fill you with joy at the prospect of eating exciting (yes, exciting!) new dishes like this Healthy Chicken Broccoli Bake! Imagine it: tender pasta, beefy mushrooms, juicy chicken, and garden-fresh broccoli in a lovely cream sauce and of course, with plenty of cheese. But now you don't have to imagine it! You can fire up the oven and enjoy the Healthy Chicken Broccoli Bake without guilt. In fact, it tastes even better than you can imagine!
Ingredients
- 8 ounces pasta such as rotini or fusilli
- 1 large (about 1-pound) head broccoli cut into bite-sized florets
- 2 tablespoons butter or olive oil
- 1 small white onion thinly sliced
- 8 ounces baby bella mushrooms thinly sliced
- 4 cloves garlic minced
- 3 tablespoons flour
- 1 cup chicken or vegetable stock
- 1 1/2 cups milk
- 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
- 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
- 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
- 2 cups sharp cheddar cheese shredded, divided
- 2 cups chicken cooked, shredded or diced
Directions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F.
- Cook the pasta in a large stockpot of generously-salted boiling water, until al dente, according to the package directions.
- About 1 minute before the pasta finishes cooking, add the broccoli to the boiling water and stir.
- Drain the pasta and the broccoli.
- Heat the butter in a large sauté pan over medium-high heat.
- Add the onion and sauté, stirring occasionally, until translucent, about 3 minutes.
- Add the mushrooms and the garlic and sauté, stirring occasionally, until the mushrooms are tender, about 5 minutes.
- Sprinkle the flour evenly over the onion mixture and stir until combined.
- Cook the onion mixture, stirring occasionally, until the raw flour smell disappears, about 1 minute.
- Add the stock and stir until most of the clumps are gone.
- Add the milk, the Dijon, the salt, and the pepper and stir until combined.
- Continue cooking the sauce until it reaches a simmer.
- Transfer the pan from the heat and stir in 1 cup of the shredded cheese until combined.
- Taste the onion mixture for seasoning.
- In a large 9x13-inch baking dish, toss the cooked pasta-broccoli mixture, the onion mixture, and the chicken together until combined.
- Smooth out the casserole into an even layer.
- Bake uncovered for 15 minutes.
- Sprinkle the remaining shredded cheese evenly on top of the casserole and bake until the cheese is melted, about 10 minutes.
- Serve.
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