The Best Tuna Casserole & Apple Pie

For this weeks meal for our friends and ourselves, we chose tuna casserole using a recipe I found on the web from Trish at her  Mom on Timeout blog.  Titled The Best Tuna Casserole, it had five stars and sounded very good to me.  The recipe below is doubled for the two casseroles and I added mushrooms but you can click on the link for the original recipe and more pics like this one.

Tuna Casserole – Adapted from Mom on Timeout

Ingredients:

12 oz wide egg noodles

½ cup unsalted butter

2 cups celery chopped

2 red bell peppers chopped

1 onion ,diced

16 oz button mushrooms, sliced

½ cup all purpose flour

1 tsp salt

1 tsp ground black pepper

4 cups whole milk

¼ cup Dijon mustard

24 oz water packed chunk tuna drained

1 cup frozen peas thawed

6 oz cheddar cheese, shredded

2 oz pepper jack cheese, shredded

1 cup panko bread crumbs

½ cup grated Parmesan cheese

2 tsp smoked paprika

2 tbsp parsley chopped

2 tbsp butter melted

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease two 8”x10” dishes and set aside.

2. Cook noodles according to package directions, removing when al dente. Drain, and return to pasta cooking pot.

3. While pasta is cooking, melt butter in a large skillet over medium heat. Add celery, bell pepper, mushrooms, and onion and cook until most of the liquid is gone stirring frequently.

4. Stir in flour, salt and pepper and cook for a few minutes.

5. Slowly add milk and cook, stirring constantly until thick and bubbly. 

6. Stir in Dijon mustard.

7. Add tuna, peas, and cheddar & pepper jack cheese and fold into the sauce.  I think I needed a larger pan.

8. Pour mixture over noodles and combine.

9. Divide noodle mixture among the two dishes.

10. Combine Panko, Parmesan cheese, smoked paprika parsley and melted butter in a small bowl and sprinkle over the top of each casserole.

11. Bake casseroles for 25 to 30 minutes, uncovered, or until heated through and golden brown on top. 

Let stand for a few minutes before serving.It turned out to be very creamy but not runny.

As for the verdict, Pat, Cindy and I thought it was very good, and Bev said it was the best she ever had so pretty high marks.  This will be our go-to recipe going forward but I’ll add about 25% more tuna next time and it required a little more S&P at the table for me.

And if the casserole wasn't enough, Bev whipped up a very good apple pie to use up some apples.

Photos can be enlarged by clicking on them and the blue words are links.

Have a great day and thanks for stopping by Almost Heaven South.

Larry

4/3/20 event date