Its sickening the way Good Eats seems to influence what I crave. Tuesday night I saw an episode about casseroles, so of course all day Wednesday I sat around thinking about what kind of casserole I should make. So I decided on a corn flake chicken casserole, but sort of made it up as I went along.

• 3 stalks of celery (diced)
• 1 medium onion (diced)
• 1 can (14.5 oz) cream of chicken soup
• 1/2 cup chicken broth (low sodium)
• 1 package (10 oz) frozen corn
• 1 package (10 oz) frozen peas
• 2 medium potatoes, your choice (I used Yukon Gold, peeled & diced)
• 1/4 cup lemon juice
• 1.5 lbs cooked chicken (3 cups?)
• 4 tbsp unsalted butter
• 2 tbps flour
• pinch of salt
• 3 cups crushed corn flakes

Preheat the oven to 350.

Blanche the potatoes, until fork tender. Then set them aside. Sweat the celery and onion in a skillet (5 mins) with a pinch of salt. Push the vegetables to the outside of the pan and use the middle to make a roux with the buttter and flour. Let the roux cook for 3-5 mins before stirring in the celery and onions. At this point, if you have some lemon pepper seasoning, you can sprinkle it into your roux.

Add 1/2 cup chicken broth and 1/4 cup lemon juice to your roux, bring to a boil for 1 minute. Stir in your frozen vegetables, add your can of cream of chicken soup, followed by the chicken and potatoes. Stir thoroughly to coat, then dump your casserole filling into a 9 x 9 or 13 x 9 baking dish. If it seems thick, don't worry. It will thin out during the bake. Top the casserole with 2-3 cups of crushed corn flakes and bake for 45 minutes.

Once you've finished, I think you're supposed to let the casserole rest for at least half an hour so that it can return to being sliceable. I got a late start on all of this so by that time it was nearly 9pm and I couldn't wait any longer. So I ate pretty much right out of the oven. I also saved an extra cup of crush cornflakes to sprinkle on top of my hot, amoeba-like piece of casserole to give it some extra crunch.

The final product was good. Not great, but solidly good. I debated whether or not I should post it, if thats any indication. I think had this been 2 months ago and I was still in the habit of craving winter comfort food I'd be more excited about this. But since I've mentally transitioned to cooking outdoor with fire, I'll just give it a thumbs up.