Tag: rice

Aunt Lil’s Tuna Casserole—A Quilling Family Recipe

In 1934, Campbell’s Soup Company introduced Cream of Mushroom and Chicken Noodle soups to the American consumer. Today, these two products still rank in the top ten shelf-stable food items sold in grocery stores.

It’s easy to understand why these soups have remained so popular. They are excellent emergency foods. When I was a kid, if the family had a flat tire or some other problem and got home late, Mom could open a couple cans of chicken noodle or cream of mushroom soup, slice some homemade bread and leftover roast and have a meal on the table before Dad finished his beer.

But the success of these soups goes well beyond their consumption as soups per se. Shortly after buying her first can of cream of mushroom soup, some inventive housewife probably said, “I wonder what would happen if I mixed a can of soup and a can of tuna with these leftover noodles?”

What happened, of course, was that a family quickly became addicted to tuna noodle casserole. At the urging of her husband and offspring, she took the casserole to a church potluck and shared the good news that it was easy to make, cheap and popular with the kids. The rest is history.

Something very similar happened with chicken noodle soup. Now, after eighty years, there are hundreds or perhaps thousands of recipes that call for a can of condensed soup, water and whatever else might be available in the refrigerator or pantry. Campbell’s has of course published quite a few recipes as a way to increase sales, but their efforts are dwarfed by the many contributions of adventurous cooks who simply wanted new dishes for the family table.

When I asked our friend Lorrie for a recipe she remembered from her childhood, she came up with “Aunt Lil’s Tuna Casserole.” It’s a good example of how cooks created variations on the standard tuna noodle casserole. To be entirely honest, I wondered whether we would like this dish, but it turned out to be much tastier than we expected. You should give your family the opportunity to try it too.

Here is Lorrie’s introduction to the recipe:

“This dish was a staple when I was growing up, and as noted in the recipe, my Grandma Quilling used to add a drained can of Veg-All to make it a complete meal.  Of course she always had a dessert course, often something one of us had baked (that was often my duty, though Grandma and Aunt Camilla baked as well) or something canned the previous summer–usually applesauce or a peach half in an amazing heavy syrup…

“Aunt Lil’s identity is somewhat shrouded in mystery.  My mother claims to have met her, but my Grandpa Q. was an only child and my Grandma had two brothers.  Exactly whose aunt she was, no one is quite sure.”

Here is how to make Aunt Lil’s Tuna Casserole.  

INGREDIENTS:

1 cup rice
1 can tuna
1 can cream of mushroom soup
1 can chicken noodle soup
2 cans water
1 can Veg-All or or other canned mixed vegetables (optional)

PROCEDURE:

Preheat the oven to 375° and grease a nine by thirteen-inch flat casserole or baking pan.

Spread the rice evenly in the casserole or pan. Flake the tuna evenly over the rice.  Use a teaspoon to spoon the mushroom soup and then the chicken noodle soup evenly over the tuna and rice. Drain the vegetables and scatter them over the other ingredients. Rinse the cans with the water and pour it gently into the pan.

Bake uncovered for forty to fifty minutes or until the liquid is absorbed and the rice is done.

Serve with salad, bread and dessert.

NOTES: When we shared this casserole with some friends, I included the vegetables. We all liked it, and a couple of us had seconds. However, we thought that it would be interesting to sprinkle some “crunchies” like crushed corn flakes on top.

Since tuna cans are smaller today than they were a few years ago, you might want to use two cans of tuna. Lorrie says that she sometimes uses two cans.

Although the original recipe does not call for vegetables, I think that her grandmother was right to add them. They add color and flavor.

Rhonda’s Rice and Broccoli Casserole

This is a recipe from Kansas, a statement which you might want to interpret as a gourmet alert. The ingredients include Velveeta. But though I hate to admit it, in spite of that this recipe makes a delicious side dish.

Rhonda, the wife of one of Jerri’s cousins, contributed the recipe to a cookbook compiled by the Farm Bureau Women of Butler County, Kansas. As I have mentioned elsewhere, my mother-in-law gave us the cookbook for Christmas many years ago, and Jerri has made many of the recipes. Some have become favorites, like and this one from Rhonda is going to be added to the list.

When I warmed up the leftover casserole to go with the hot dogs and pasta salad we set out to feed my brother-in-law and his work crew at the cabin, he remarked how well the broccoli went with the rice as he took a second helping. It is indeed a tasty combination.

When I confessed that the sauce was made with canned soups and Velveeta, he guffawed and asked me if I finally was abandoning my purist policies.

One of his grandsons and a member of the work crew looked puzzled. “What’s Velveeta?” he asked.

“It’s like American cheese, like the single slices you get on cheeseburgers,” I said, “but it comes in a box.” I got the box out to show him.

“It’s a brand name,” my brother-in-law explained to him.

“OK,” said he, and took a serving.

I can remember the box of Velveeta in the refrigerator at home. Like Rhonda, Mom used it in cooking because it made really smooth sauces. Velveeta was invented in 1923 in Monroe, New York, and was named for its velvety smooth texture. It is a dairy product, so even Wisconsinites can admit to using it without shame. It is not, however, to be confused with a good Wisconsin brick, Cheddar or Colby.

When Jerri and I were first married, most Kansas supermarkets offered Velveeta, ground Parmesan, and a handful of other cheeses, nearly all from Kraft. Last summer, when we stopped at Emporia, Kansas, to stock up on the best flour I know (Hudson Cream), I made a point of inspecting the cheese case.

There were probably a hundred different varieties and brands of cheese made by cheese makers from Oregon to Vermont as well as Wisconsin, an enormous improvement in the last four decades. I almost felt like I had wandered into a good Wisconsin supermarket.

Velveeta was still in the cheese case, but my attitude towards it had changed. Even the ancient Romans used some processed foods including fish sauces and cheeses flavored with garlic or sweetened with honey as well as salted cheeses shipped to Rome from across the empire, perhaps to be eaten with the hams imported from Belgium. We have chemists today to make fancier processed foods, but maybe that’s just progress.

Even without scientists, our ancestors were pretty clever when it came to inventing new foods. For instance, yogurt, tofu and most of the cheeses we enjoy today have been around for thousands of years. What I finally have come to understand is that Velveeta is really just another in the long list of foods that start with milk. Not my favorite to eat on crackers, but a good ingredient in some recipes.

Like Rhonda’s Rice and Broccoli Casserole which makes six to eight servings of a delicious side dish.

INGREDIENTS:

3/4 cup white rice
1 1/2 cups water
Scant 1/2 tsp. salt
1 1/2 lbs. broccoli crowns
4 T butter
1/2 cup chopped celery
1/3 cup chopped onion
1 can condensed cream of chicken soup
1 can condensed cream of mushroom soup
1/2 lb. Velveeta cheese

PROCEDURE:

Rinse the rice, then put it in a saucepan with the water and salt. Bring to a boil, then stir and reduce the heat to a low simmer. Cook the rice covered for fifteen to twenty minutes until the water is absorbed. Remove the pan from the heat.

Prepare the vegetables while the rice is cooking. Wash the broccoli, discard the tough bottom part of the stems and divide the crowns into bite-sized pieces. Clean and chop the celery and onion into a quarter to half-inch dice.

Preheat the oven to 350º.

Blanch the broccoli in a microwave oven or covered saucepan with a little water for four or five minutes until it is crisp but tender. Drain and set aside the broccoli. Cut the Velveeta into half inch cubes.

Melt the butter in a two quart saucepan over low heat. Add the celery and onion and cook them for about four minutes until they are soft. Add the undiluted soups and Velveeta and stir until you have a smooth sauce. Remove the sauce from the heat.

Spread the cooked rice evenly over the bottom of a two quart baking dish. Spread the broccoli on the rice and spoon the sauce over the broccoli. Put the dish on a center shelf in the oven and bake the casserole for about thirty minutes until the rice is bubbling around the edges and the sauce is just beginning to brown.

NOTES: Rhonda’s recipe calls for two ten ounce packages of frozen broccoli spears and butter or margarine. I prefer butter and fresh broccoli when you can get it.