I’m not going to lie. This freezer cooking friday is really helping me get ready for back to school. But really, I just love that on nights where I don’t feel like cooking, I can grab something from the freezer like this spinach and chicken alfredo recipe and have dinner ready! 🙂 This recipe is a keeper. It got two thumbs up from my husband. And I love that I can attempt to get that good spinach in my boys.
What I love about this recipe is that it’s great as a casserole, but you can make it at night for dinner as well. It’s one of those batch cooking meets the freezer. The next time I make it, I’m going to create it – eat it – and then the leftovers will go right into the freezer. Now I will say that when you’re freezer cooking with pasta, it tends to soak up a lot of the sauce. I noticed that the sauce was much more present the night I served it than in the casserole. It really didn’t bother me much, but if you’re more of a saucy person, you might want to up the alfredo before you put it in the freezer.
To make this spinach and alfredo chicken casserole you will need:
6 cooked chicken breasts, cut into bite size pieces
2 Cans alfredo sauce
4 TB pesto
2 TB olive oil
4 tsp minced garlic
2 Bags fresh spinach
2 lbs penne pasta
Now for this recipe to be packed with chicken, you’ll need six chicken breasts. As you can see from the picture, I had about half that amount. I decided to get the all natural chicken which is really twice the price. Therefore, I bought half the amount of chicken. To make it spread I usually chop it very small.
Bring a big pot of water to boil and cook the pasta per the instructions.
While the noodles are boiling, cook the chicken in the olive oil. It takes about 6 to 8 minutes per side depending on how thick your chicken is. Once it’s cooked through, remove it from the pan and chop it up into bite size pieces. In the hot pan add your garlic and saute for one minute only. Add one bag of spinach and saute until it withers completely. Remove it form the pan and add it to the chicken. Place the second bag of spinach into the pan and let it wither as well.
Once the pasta is drained, return it to the large pot and add the wilted spinach, chicken and garlic.
Add the two cans of alfredo sauce as well as the pesto. Give it a good stir and add it to two 9×13 pans to add to the freezer. If you’re enjoying it that night, you can add it to a casserole dish and bake at 350 for 3o minutes.
I ended up lightly dusting the top of the casserole with bread crumbs as well as parmesan ramano cheese. Yum! I like a little bit of crunch!
Enjoy!
Find even more Chicken Freezer meals!
- 6 cooked chicken breasts, cut into bite size pieces
- 2 Cans alfredo sauce
- 4 TB pesto
- 2 TB olive oil
- 4 tsp minced garlic
- 2 Bags fresh spinach
- 2 lbs penne pasta
- Bring a pot of water to boiling and cook the pasta per the directions on the box.
- Drizzle olive oil into a pan on the stove and cook the chicken through. Remove and cut into bite size pieces.
- In the same hot pan, add the garlic and saute for 1 minutes. Add one bag of spinach and saute until withered. Set aside with the chicken. Saute the remaining bag of spinach until wilted.
- Once the pasta is drained, place it back into the large stockpot. Add the chicken, spinach and garlic.
- Add the alfredo sauce and pesto and stir until incorporated.
- Spoon into two 9x13 pans that have been sprayed with cooking spray. Bake for 30 minutes at 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
- If freezing, let thaw before cooking. Bake 1 hour on 350 degrees fahrenheit.
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How long will they last in the freezer?