Taco Chicken and Chips

Do you have a lot of leftovers after Christmas? Do you anticipate leftovers after your New Years celebration? Looking for something yummy to eat before your New Years diet? This is a great way to use up your leftovers! I recently found this recipe in the most recent edition of my church's cookbook. I didn't have all the ingredients so I altered it to fit what I had in my kitchen. Feel free to do the same! I had leftover tortilla chips from a work potluck on Christmas, leftover cooked chicken in my freezer, and leftover shredded cheese and sour cream from an unknown time.

• 1 can cream of chicken soup
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1 teaspoon taco seasoning
• 2-3 cups shredded, cooked chicken
• 2 cups shredded cheese
• 1/2 cup chopped onion (optional)
• 1/2 cup chopped pepper (optional, but oh so pretty if you use different colored peppers!)
• 3-4 cups crushed tortilla chips (mine were a little stale and this still turned out great! Finally a way to use stale tortilla chips! :-)  )

Combine cream of chicken soup, sour cream, and taco seasoning. Mix and set aside. In a ungreased 2 quart casserole dish, cover bottom with half of your chicken. Top with half of soup mixture and pepper/onions. Layer half and cheese and half of chips. Continue with rest of chicken, soup mixture, onions/peppers, cheese, and chips. Pop in a 350 degree oven for 30 minutes.

***Time Saving Tip*** Whenever I am cooking chicken for a recipe and have some leftover, instead of throwing "extra" into the dish, I freeze it in a Ziploc freezer bag. I do the same thing with "extra" onions, peppers, ground beef, etc. Since I did this, it made the prep time for this meal FIVE minutes!!! This is also a great way to save a little money too. By not adding "extra" ingredients into your dish and instead freezing them, you may not need to buy a pepper at the store this week or a package of chicken and can just use what you alread have stored away in your freezer!