WCCO Photographer's Award-Winning Hot Dish Recipe
Chicken Cordon Hot Dish Recipe
By WCCO Photographer Nick Lunemann
INGREDIENTS:
6 boneless skinless chicken thighs
Cubed ham
Cream of Chicken Soup
1 bag frozen Tater Tots
6-7 cubes of velveeta cheese
Packet of Chicken Gravy mix
White American Cheese
1/2 cup of milk
Bread Crumbs
STEP 1: MARINATE CHICKEN OVERNIGHT
Use Lawry's Seasoning Salt, pepper, vegetable oil, beer can chicken seasoning (found at Walmart)
STEP 2 (the next day): HOT DISH PREP
Pan sear the chicken until golden but not cooked entirely. Proceed to shred the chicken ( I use two forks) and place in dish.
Next Cube some Ham and place in pan on medium with just a drop of Honey until brown and place in dish.
One large can of cream of chicken soup and stir until mixed well.
STEP 3: TOTS
Place one bag of Tator Tots in a bowl and microwave for 6 minutes until soft.
While that's cooking cut 6 or 7 cubes of Velveeta cheese into cubes. (We'll use them later)
Take one packet of Chicken Gravy mix and make it in a sauce pan.
Take tots out of microwave and while using a mixer proceed to dice the tots.
Now grab those Velveeta cubes and ham/chicken soup gravy and throw those into the bowl and continue to mix until it is all even. Let that cool for a couple minutes until you can pretty much make a potato ball in your hand.
Now throw that on top of the chicken and ham and spread it out like cake frosting.
Almost done!
Throw a little bread crumbs to give it that extra crisp.
STEP 4: BAKE
Throw that in the oven on 400 to heat up the soup and chicken.
While that's in the oven cut up several cubes of White American Cheese and place in a bowl with a 1/2 cup of milk and melt in microwave for 2 minutes and stir that gooey cheese up.
Finally pull that dish out of the oven and carefully pour that molten cheese on top of the taters until covers it entirely.