Salmon & Rice Casserole

Tonight I was in charge of dinner, and I was in the mood for rice.  We also had a can of salmon in the cupboard, so I typed in both ingredients and came up with this. I thought that sounded a little boring, so I planned to add some dill and lemon juice, and then when I got home and peeked in the cupboard for the salmon, I spotted a can of 98% fat free cream of celery soup, so I grabbed it. Here's what I ended up with:

1 cup uncooked rice
1 can salmon
1 can cream of celery soup
1 can skim milk (using the empty soup can)
juice of 1 lemon
2 eggs
pepper, dill, and parmesan cheese (1/8 or 1/4 cup at the most) to taste

Cook the rice according to package directions

Preheat oven to 300 degrees

Grease a small casserole dish (or use a non-stick dish like the cool ones my aunt got for me)

While rice cooks, mix soup, milk (measured using soup can), eggs (slightly beaten), and lemon juice, and mix well. Add seasoning to taste. I didn't add any salt at all because the soup and the salmon were both already quite salty, and I didn't regret it - the dish was just right in the salt department, so unless you have low sodium everything else, I would highly recommend NOT adding any additional salt. I thought I had used a lot of pepper, but I would have liked even more. I could have left out the parmesan cheese and probably would have been just as happy with it, but it was good. I used a lot of dried dill, and I'm not sure if it made a difference or not, but dill goes very well with salmon so I wouldn't leave it out.

Once rice is cooked, spread 1/3 of the rice on the bottom of the casserole. Follow with a layer of 1/2 of the salmon, then another 1/3 of the rice, the rest of the salmon, and top with the remaining rice. Pour the soup/milk/egg/lemon juice mix over the whole thing, letting it soak in. Sprinkle the top with parmesan cheese if desired.

Bake uncovered at 300 degrees for about 45 minutes, or until it's all set and the top has started to brown nicely. Remove from oven and let sit for 5 to 10 minutes before serving. This would be really great with a simple mixed green salad, or broccoli, or green beans. It was quite yummy! Also, you could leave out the parmesan cheese and use an egg substitute to easily make this low-fat and still just as delish. As it was, I don't think it was too fatty, just enough to make a good, hearty, satisfying dinner.

So I think this blog will mainly be food and not so much books, and I'm sure it will only be very occasional. Also, I'm far too lazy to take pictures, so I doubt you'll get many - you'll just have to imagine. But this evening I actually made something new, and it came out well, and I thought I would share! If you ever try it, let me know how it works out.

Happy eating!

Hello!

My sister just started a blog, on which she plans to discuss books she's reading.  I thought that was a good idea, but I also want to discuss stuff I cook, plus I didn't want to just steal her idea, plus I already have goodreads.com on which to discuss books.

So here I will occasionally post pictures and recipes and discussion about new adventures in the kitchen, plus follow Paul around when he is cooking.  Even more occasionally I might talk about a book I'm reading.

After participating in my good friend Nicole's Whip It Up blog this summer, I miss posting about my foodcapades, so I think this will mainly be yet another food blog.  Probably more for my benefit than others', but a few people have commented that they tried and enjoyed a recipe I posted for Whip It Up, so maybe this will be cool for all.