A Month of Dinners-Day 1-Chicken Florentine

I decided to plan out our dinners a month in advance for 2011. Day 1 was Chicken Florentine. Here's the recipe and plenty of pictures, because seeing food is almost as good as tasting it! (Check out the bottom for the verdict.)

Chicken Florentine Casserole

Ingredients

• 4 skinless, boneless chicken breast halves
• 1/4 cup butter
• 3 teaspoons minced garlic
• 1 tablespoon lemon juice
• 1 (10.75 ounce) can condensed cream of mushroom soup
• 1 tablespoon Italian seasoning
• 1/2 cup half-and-half
• 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
• 2 (13.5 ounce) cans spinach, drained
• 4 ounces fresh mushrooms, sliced
• 2/3 cup bacon bits
• 2 cups shredded mozzarella cheese

Directions

1.   Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Place the chicken breast halves on a baking sheet; bake 20 to 30 minutes, until no longer pink and juices run clear. Remove from heat, and set aside.

2.   Increase the oven temperature to 400 degrees F (200 degrees C).

3.   Melt the butter in a medium saucepan over medium heat. Stirring constantly, mix in the garlic, lemon juice, cream of mushroom soup, Italian seasoning, half-and-half, and Parmesan cheese.

4.   Arrange the spinach over the bottom of a 9x9 inch baking dish. Cover the spinach with the mushrooms.

5.  Pour half the mixture from the saucepan over the mushrooms.

6. Arrange chicken breasts in the dish, and cover with the remaining sauce mixture.

7. Sprinkle with bacon bits, and top with mozzarella cheese.

8.   Bake 20 to 25 minutes in the 400 degrees F (200 degrees C) oven, until bubbly and lightly browned.

Modifications: (All recipes are presented in their original forms. Any changes I made are listed below.)
-For starters, I used (8) chicken tenderloins instead of (4) breasts because that's what I had in my freezer. I actually think I like this a bit more because it made spooning out smaller portions much easier.
-Instead of canned spinach, I used two boxes of frozen spinach.
-Because I am trying to cut calories, I used Olivio light buttery spread (a great substitute for margarine if you're trying to be healthier, but don't want to do butter!)
-Since I had leftover bacon from New Year's day breakfast, I used it instead of Bacon Bits.
-Although I am usually the one ADDING cheese, I actually cut the mozzarella down to 1 cup. Once I got half of the cheese on there, it looked pretty good. 


Changes for next time:
-I'll try using 2% milk instead of half and half next time to trim some calories and fat. 
-The bacon was ok, but not so wonderful that it was really needed. Maybe no bacon?
-Drain the spinach a bit more. Although this was called a casserole, it stayed pretty saucey/soupy. It's possible that there was too much water left in the spinach.

The verdict: De-freakin'-licious! I was slightly concerned how the husband would react to the spinach, but he loved it! He loved it so much that he requested seconds! This is truly unheard of! This gem of a dish will definitely be in our regular rotation.