John Wayne Casserole

[AndrewF]

I've returned to the John Wayne Casserole.

I managed to solve all the problems I had with it last time.

I call it "The Duke" John Wayne Casserole.

Largely because it calls for Duke's mayo. There are a lot of problems with all of the recipes I found for this casserole, mostly they get too skimpy on the biscuits or spread the topping too thin, or drench the biscuits in unmetered liquid and make them soggy.

The recipe I based this off of also called for a mixture of Mozzarella and Cheddar. Mozzarella doesn't belong in anything named after John Wayne. And it said use plain table salt in the fajita vegetables. Boo! So I changed it to seasoning salt.

These internet recipes also tend to get skimpy on the cheese.

The great thing about making this casserole is that it's built heavily around items that go on sale at my grocery store all the time and ground beef that I got on markdown and froze.

I find that the 9x13 is the secret weapon against grocery store inflation, which has gotten so bad lately that you bring in $100 bill and you get a frozen pizza that's 20% smaller, a bag of cat food with ten less pounds of cat food, and a can of Folger's that's missing half the coffee, and you *might* have enough left for a candy bar at the checkout.

[Realist]

Decade or more ago I came across:

Great Depression cooking with Clara

Her stories were pretty good, especially the staples they had to secure when there was nothing to secure.

You all wanted to know about the effects of inflation.  Many likely have no understanding about the effects of crushing deflation, and what comes about from it.  Clara is going to explain it if anyone cares to learn.  She offers quite a few videos.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9zXqkHvs0po

[AndrewF]

Deflation is not a serious issue in the modern economy. This economy sucks, it is painful, but it's not in a rapid death spiral where we're looking at 40% unemployment within a year.

The Federal Reserve is hiking interest rates, and that might get inflation under control, but it's more likely to spark a wave of bankruptcies when you combine it with all the other nonsense that's coming from government that's causing the "inflation", the "inflation" is mostly due to taxation at the cash register (tariffs) and corporate looting, and nobody is doing much about the corporate looting except removing the few safeguards that stopped them.

They want to rig the stock market so that companies don't even have to release public quarterly earnings statements anymore and the only people who know what's going on in there so they can time their investments are the executives and the Inner Party.

With "AI", there are no earnings. There are circular investments and there's a "cash burn rate", but that's about it. It's not a question of if we're in a bubble, it's how bad is it and when does it pop.

Anyway, here's another great recipe.

Comforting Chicken Casserole from Pressure Luck

I'm making this one to take to a party tomorrow.

I'll price it all out here.

1 rotisserie chicken (Sam's/Costco have 3 pound chickens for $4.99, they lose money on them to get you into the store)

1 (10.5-ounce) can Cream of Chicken Soup (see Jeff’s Tips) (Sam's sells these on pallets for what comes out to 82 cents per can for Campbell's if you buy 8 cans)

1 (10.5-ounce) can Cream of Mushroom Soup ($1.69 for Campbell's at Target which is the best price I've seen in a regular store, could not find this at Sam's)

1 teaspoon Better Than Bouillon Roasted Chicken Base (see Jeff’s Tips) (Each jar cost me $4.99 at Ross Dress For Less which had a bunch in the food section, and it was organic. Each jar has 38 tsps. So 13 cents per tsp. I use 2 level tsp, so 26 cents.)

1 cup mayonnaise (Use Duke's. 13 cents an ounce in 64 oz jars on Amazon was the best unit price I found. So $1.04.)

1 cup whole milk (Target has whole milk $1.64 per half gallon, so 21 cents rounded up.)

8-ounce bag (2 cups) finely shredded Cheddar cheese (any blend you like) ($1.99 on sale at Jewel Osco wyb 3, so I have a lot of these in the fridge. Rustic Cut triple state cheddar)

10-16 ounce bag frozen vegetable mix (see Jeff’s Tips) (Target has them for 99 cents which is the best price I found for 12 oz mixed veggies)

1/2 teaspoon of each/any (optional): seasoned salt, dried or rubbed sage, Italian seasoning, onion powder/granulated onion (Cost is negligible, but as always, get Target Good & Gather for bulk spices, or Badia, Great Value, etc. Double the Italian Seasoning to 1 tsp. Get your seasoning salt in bulk at Sam's Club.)

 1/2 cup garlic herb cheese (optional) (Not optional. LOL Use a puck of Boursin from Sam's Club. Do not buy this at the grocery store or Walmart where you will pay $6.99-$7.99 per puck. They sell 3 puck packs at Sam's with two Garlic and Herb like for this recipe and one Hot Honey & Garlic which you should use in something like Jeffrey's Instant Pot Spaghetti. Which is also a great way to use up any "extra" packets of red pepper flakes from a Sam's Club Cafe pizza, which are 1/4 tsp per pack. DO NOT USE Hot Honey in this casserole. Buy 3 packs for $6.99-$9.99 at Sam's. Freeze the ones you won't use before the best buy date and they will still thaw out okay for cooking purposes. Each puck is roughly $3 because sometimes there's a sale.)

Two tubes of Ritz Crackers. Crush them inside the tubes and pour into a smaller mixing bowl. Microwave a full stick of butter in a big coffee cup until melted and pour over the crushed crackers. This will go over the chicken mixture in the 13x9 pan. Jeffrey says use one tube and half a stick of butter, but that leads to a really wimpy crust. (Do NOT use generic Ritz crackers. I've tried this and Target's Market Pantry are not the same. So you will be on the hook for $1.99-$4.69 per box of crackers and you need half of them for the topping for this casserole. Got butter on sale for $1.99 a pound, needs a quarter pound (1 stick))

This is a go-to for "feeds 2 men for three days for ~$20" or even to take to parties.

While Jeffrey says to cook the egg noodles in a pot of boiling water, it's easier to just do it in the instant pot. Skip any salt for this and just dump the 12 ounces (NOT 16 OZ!) of noodles in the pot with three cups of water (four if you're making 16 oz of noodles), and put the lid on and pressure cook on high for two minutes and quick release the steam when done.

Carefully dump out any residual water without spilling the noodles into the sink.

If you froze the Boursin, be sure to let it thaw on the counter thoroughly before starting the mix.

When you have the chicken mixture in the big mixing bowl, you absolutely can use a hand mixer to mix everything together, but watch out that you don't send food everywhere because this is a large amount of food.

[AndrewF]

After I mentioned the Instant Pot Spaghetti to use up the Hot Honey and Garlic Boursin I figured I might as well do this one too.

The frozen meatballs can be purchased at Sam's. You'll get enough to make this four times, at least, so it works out to half the cost of grocery store meatballs.

Use the Hot Honey Boursin in place of the Garlic and Herbs. This gets rid of your "oddball" flavor from the Sam's multi-pack.

Use Bertolli spaghetti from the value pack at Sam's. It has other pasta types. You can use the elbows for Mac and Cheese or even Jeffrey's Godfather Pasta instead of cavatappi, and the Penne can stand in for many other expensive types that Jeffry calls for in other recipes.

Definitely use Garlic Better than Boullion like he recommends. It adds so much garlic flavor that I accidentally forgot the garlic in the saute step once and it barely even mattered. Chicken broth just doesn't add that punch.

For marinara, use Rao's. Sam's has a very good price when you buy two jars at a time. How hard is it to use up marinara sauce?

For the cherry tomatoes on top, use whatever the grocery store has on sale. Jewel has at least 4-5 kinds and one is almost always $1.99 with a coupon that week.

Don't use Tony Chachere's creole, use Zatarain's (less salty).

For hot sauce, use Frank's. Sold in bulk at Sam's.

For crushed red pepper I use "extra" packets from Sam's Cafe (1/4 tsp per packet)

Sam's sells grated parmesan in bulk.

One of the things my mother complains of is that Jeffrey's recipes get expensive, but they don't have to be.

For example, I use Olive Garden Italian dressing in his godfather pasta, elbows instead of cavatappi, diced bacon in place of pancetta, and diced pepperoni instead of the various "4 oz each" of the other meats. It still comes out fine. If you follow recipes blindly, you'll never optimize them for taste or cost.

Jeffrey might be rich and used to living in HCOL cities like NY or SF, but for people on a budget, they have to figure out how to make the math work.