Chicken Cordon Bleu Lasagna
Like other months, the April calendar is filled with some interesting days of celebration: Sorry Charlie Day (6), 8 Track Tape Day (11), Take a Wild Guess Day (15) and Impossible Astronaut Day(23).
In honor of National Cordon Bleu Day (April 4), this month’s recipe is a different kind of lasagna. The choice was made because National Garlic Day (April 19) might not have gone over so well.
Chicken Cordon Bleu is thought to have been created by a Valaisian (Swiss) chef in the 1940s as a way to feed a large group of people. But some people dispute that and say that it originated in France in 1930 where the award-winning dish was named le Cordon Bleu (the Blue Ribbon). When Julia Child included the recipe in her cookbook, it became popular in the U.S. in the 1960s and 1970s. In fact, American soldiers in WWII developed a fondness for this dish and brought the recipe home to enjoy.
Recipe:
Ingredients
7 tablespoons butter, divided
2 tsp. minced garlic
½ tsp. onion powder
1/4 cup all purpose flour
3 1/2 cups milk
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 teaspoon black pepper
3 cups shredded Swiss cheese, divided
1 8 oz..pkg. cream cheese-regular or low fat
2/3 cup breadcrumbs
1 9-ounce box oven-ready lasagna noodles (12 noodles), cooked
4 cups cooked, chopped chicken (rotisserie chicken works well)
2 cups cooked, chopped deli ham
1 1/2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese
Instructions:
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Spray a 9×13-inch pan with nonstick spray.
Melt 5 tablespoons butter in a large pot over medium heat. Add the garlic and cook, stirring occasionally, for 1 minute. Whisk in the flour and cook 1 to 2 minutes until nutty and fragrant but not brown. Whisk in the cream cheese and milk. Add the salt, pepper and onion powder and simmer 10 minutes.
Stir in 1/3 cup of the Swiss cheese, and cook an additional 5 minutes. Remove from the heat.
Melt the remaining 2 tablespoons of butter in a nonstick skillet over medium heat. Once melted, add the bread crumbs and stir occasionally until lightly golden, 1 to 2 minutes. Set aside.
To assemble the lasagna: Spoon 1/3 cup of the sauce over the bottom of the prepared baking dish. Use 4 lasagna noodles to cover the bottom of the dish. Spoon 2/3 cup sauce on top of the noodles, followed by half of the chicken and ham, 1/2 cup Swiss cheese.. Repeat with another set of 4 noodles, 2/3 cup sauce, the rest of the chicken and ham. Finish by layering 4 more noodles, the rest of the sauce and the remaining cheese, this time including the mozzarella.
Cover the pan with a sheet of foil that has been sprayed with nonstick spray, and bake 20 minutes. Remove the foil, top with buttered bread crumbs, and bake an additional 20 minutes, until the cheese is gooey and noodles are soft. Let rest 10 minutes before serving.