Cheesy Hash Brown Casserole

I love having a casserole that can be prepared in the slow cooker because it frees up my oven for cooking other dishes, especially around the holidays! These creamy, cheesy potatoes are great for an everyday Sunday brunch with your family or for a special Christmas dinner with out-of-town guests.

Cheesy Hash Brown Casserole
Crock Pot Recipe

Ingredients
32 oz package frozen diced hash brown potatoes, thawed
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 onion, chopped
10.5 oz can gluten free cream of chicken soup
2 cups shredded cheese
1 cup sour cream

Directions
1. Mix all ingredients in slow cooker.
2. Cook on low 3-4 hours.
3. Potatoes should be creamy. Be careful not to overcook!

Notes
• Make sure to check the ingredients on the package of hash browns to ensure they are gluten free. Many generic/store brands include wheat. I use Ore Ida name brand potatoes. Also, make sure you are buying diced potatoes, not shredded potatoes.
• In place of the can of cream of chicken soup, you can use 1/2 cup Augason Farms cream of chicken soup mix and 1 cup of water (as seen in photo above).
• The original recipe calls for shredded cheddar cheese, but I find that it makes the dish too greasy. I prefer to use a four cheese Mexican blend because it melts nicely. Colby Jack or any other soft cheese blend would work well, too.

Recipe adapted from Recipes for Our Daily Bread.

Cream of Chicken Soup

I've posted before about feeling like I had to start over with cooking when I went gluten free because of one simple ingredient: cream of condensed soup. It seemed like every recipe called for at least one can, and I could never figure out a good substitute that would still have the dish turn out the same way as before. Then I discovered Great Value gluten free cream of mushroom soup by accident at Walmart one day. Then at a later point, I found Great Value gluten free cream of chicken soup at a different Walmart in town, also by mistake!

After those discoveries, I stocked up (because I didn't want to have to accidentally find them again!) and then did some research to see if I could find a better (read: cheaper) alternative. (At $1.42 per can here in South Dakota, that's crazy expensive compared to the non-GF version!) That's when I discovered this amazing product: Augason Farms Cream of Chicken Soup Mix.

The reviews on Amazon looked promising, so I decided to give it a shot! I actually bought the product from Target, though, because of the 5% discount and free shipping by using my REDcard (every woman's best friend!).

The following recipe is the golden ticket to using this product. The canister contains nearly 11 cups of soup mix, so it can make roughly 21 equivalent cans of condensed soup. Calculating the Target price of $19.99 (at my time of purchase) with the REDcard discount brings the cost down to $18.99 which is only $0.90 per can!

Equals 1 can of condensed soup:
  1/2 cup Augason Farms Cream of Chicken Soup Mix
  1 3/4 cups water
Bring water to a boil. Add soup mix. Simmer 12-15 minutes, stirring frequently.

The best part is, if you are using this in a crock pot recipe, you can skip the cooking part completely. Just add the water and soup mix to your slow cooker and it will do the work for you!

One final note: IT'S DELICIOUS!