Three-cheese chicken penne florentine( CL)

Last night I sat down with the latest issue of Cooking Light and this casserole caught my eye. Ironically when Robin asked me today if we could have pasta for dinner, I thought of this casserole. I actually had everything to make it so I didnt need to go to the store. I took a picture of the pan because I wanted Cyndi to see that my mushrooms defrosted perfectly. Two weeks ago, I bought 2lbs of shiitaki mushrooms for 1.99(reduced). I decided to freeze them and was pleasantly surprised that they didnt turn black as Cyndi's had. Maybe because these were shiitake and they arent that watery. I used low-carb penne for this too.

The recipe calls for Rotissiere chicken but I had some bone-in breasts that I just bought for 99 cents a lb( Meijer in MI). I roasted 4 of them( I'll make chicken salad with the other 2). The recipe calls for cottage cheese too. I just picked up a large container of MI brand cottage cheese and was bummed that I had to use it. When I make casseroles/lasagna's, I prefer to use a store brand cottage cheese. Consequently, I used about 1/2 cup less than the 2 cups called for.

I sauteed onion, peppers( I used orange peppers I had frozen), and spinach. That gets mixed in with the pureed cottage cheese, 1/2 cup milk, shreeded cheese's and a can of soup( groan). The recipe called for reduced fat cream of chicken, I used reduced fat cream of celery( thats what I had at home).

It all gets thrown in a casserole dish and topped with more cheese. It was quite watery when I came out of the oven, but I let it sit for about 10 min and it firmed up.

Verdict: I thought it was rather bland, I did add some pepper to the recipe, even though it didnt call for it. It definatly needs some more herbs and spices. Robin liked it( I knew she would, she is a casserole kinda girl). It was light though, I didnt feel heavy and gross after eating it. I really love that dreamfields pasta. Its a great thing for diabetics.