Holiday Meal Casserole

Name Change?

Even before testing this recipe, I knew the name would have to change. You'd never know from Grandma's title--Chicken or Turkey Casserole--that this dish also contained Stove Top Stuffing and Tater Tots. But before I got to the name change, I had to figure something else out first. Namely, was this dish even worthy of inclusion in my digital box? I had to taste it first, and then I could think about a new moniker. A Sunday dinner with a crowd seemed the perfect time to try it out.   

How to Make Holiday Meal Casserole

The Tater Tots were the first thing to go into the casserole dish. I made a layer and reserved the rest for the topping. 

Next was the sauce layer, where I had issues. Chicken gravy doesn't seem to come in cans anymore, so I had no idea how big of a container I was looking for. This jar seemed a close approximation for a can. It was 12 ounces.   

I poured the gravy into a bowl, along with the other sauce ingredients--a can of cream of chicken soup and a cup of sour cream. I wasn't sure how much chicken equated to a "can of chicken chunks" so I decided to err on the side of more rather than less. I diced and added three cups of cooked chicken to the bowl, figuring that two cups would have also been fine. 

I mixed that together and then spread it over the Tater Tots. 

The next layer needed to be cooked before I could put it on. I followed the directions on the back of the box and soon had steamy stuffing. 

I then spread it over the chicken and sauce layer. 

For the last layer, I was instructed to crumble the Tater Tots. However, they were still frozen and impossible to crumble. I ended up chopping them into small chunks, which I sprinkled over the top. I wasn't sure how much cheese to add because the recipe card gave no quantity. One cup seemed the right amount of coverage for the top.  

It was already looking tasty. It just needed to bake. I had doubts about the 30-minute baking time, which didn't seem long enough to cook all the layers thoroughly, especially since the bottom layer was frozen. Sure enough, when the 30 minutes were up, the cheese wasn't melted, and there wasn't a lot of bubbling going on. I left it for 10 more and then took it out. 

The Verdict

The first thing I noticed about this dish was its temperature. It was warm but not piping hot, so next time, I'll add at least five more minutes.

But will there be a next time? Yes, there will. This dish received high praise from everyone at the table, who felt like the addition of the stuffing turned it into something special. They liked the Tater Tots, too.   

As for me, the tots brought back fond memories. In this post, I mentioned that my aunts all had their specialty dishes, one of which was my Aunt Joyce's Dutch oven Tater Tot casserole. I don't remember what was in it except for Tater Tots, but I do remember looking forward to it whenever we gathered in the mountains. 

Grandma's recipe wasn't a cookout-in-the-mountains kind of casserole. Instead, it seemed like a holiday meal. The potatoes and gravy were present, as was the stuffing and the poultry. Grandma mentioned that turkey could also be used, which would truly make it taste like Thanksgiving. Thus, I settled on Holiday Meal Casserole as its new name. If you're in the mood for a celebration, try this casserole. If you're feeling extra fancy, add a slice of pie to go along with it. 

That's what I did.