Scrambled Eggs, Cheese, and Avocado Tortilla Bowl Recipe
September 16, 2025
Chicken Tetrazzini – creamy Italian pasta bake Recipe
Chicken Tetrazzini is an enormous, bubbly pasta bake with a creamy cheese sauce, juicy chicken and buttery garlic mushrooms. It’s about as traditional as a creamy pasta bake can get!
Chicken Tetrazzini
I name Tetrazzini an Italian pasta bake simply because it sounds good to say so, however in precise reality, there’s nothing Italian about this creamy-oh-so-cheesy pasta casserole apart from the truth that it’s named after an Italian opera singer, Luisa Tetrazzini.
It’s mentioned {that a} Chef at a lodge within the States invented this dish particularly for her, and you’ll by no means discover it in a (actual) Italian cookbook. However that doesn’t make this any much less scrumptious. Juicy chicken with garlic butter mushrooms smothered in a béchamel sauce, tossed by means of slick pasta and baked till bubbly…. UGH! I’m torturing myself simply writing about it!! 😂
This pasta casserole bake is comprised of scratch. Canned soup has no place round right here!!
What you want for creamy Chicken Tetrazzini Sauce
Right here’s what it’s worthwhile to make the cream sauce for Chicken Tetrazzini: butter, flour, chicken broth/inventory, milk, cream and cheese.
The premise of Tetrazzini sauce is a béchamel sauce. Whereas a primary béchamel is made with simply butter, flour and milk, for Tetrazzini, we dial up the deliciousness by including chicken inventory (for flavour), cream (for richness) and cheese (an excellent factor in something!).
What goes in Chicken Tetrazzini
As for the pasta bake itself, right here’s what you want:
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Pasta – lengthy strand pasta like spaghetti is conventional, however this recipe works completely with brief pastas like macaroni, penne, ziti, rigatoni, spirals. Simply keep away from tiny pasta like risoni/orzo, ditalini, tiny shells or novelty pastas like alphabet pasta – they’re too small;
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Chicken – thighs are greatest as a result of they keep juicy even after the double cook dinner (seared then baked), however breast and tenderloin are effective too. Shopping for pre-cooked chicken will pace issues up, however the sauce gained’t be as good as a result of it will get a flavour increase by cooking the sauce in the identical pot the chicken is seared in (the golden bits left within the pan from the chicken is a free flavour increase for the sauce);
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Mushrooms – something sliceable is ok, I’ve simply used regular button mushrooms right here;
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Butter – used to cook dinner the mushrooms, and in addition because the fats into which the flour is combined which thickens the liquids to make the creamy sauce;
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Garlic and onion – important flavour base.
Methods to make Chicken Tetrazzini
Prepare dinner the chicken first as a result of the golden bits left within the pot will dissolve into the sauce which provides a stack of flavour. The chicken doesn’t must be totally cooked by means of – as soon as chopped into small items, it should take mere minutes to complete cooking within the oven.
Skip the shortcut retailer purchased roast chicken. Cooking your personal is a lot tastier as a result of the sauce will get a large free flavour increase from deglazing the pot.
After the chicken is cooked, we cook dinner the mushrooms and onion, then combine within the flour earlier than including the liquids. That is a straightforward technique to make sure your creamy sauce comes out clean slightly than with flour lumps with out the necessity of a whisk or slowly pouring the milk in. By mixing the flour into the cooked mushrooms, it will get dispersed which makes it far much less liable to lumps when the milk is added. Tip of the day! 😎
Methods to inform when the béchamel sauce is thick sufficient
Use the “path” take a look at (Step 5 above) – coat the again of your wood spoon with the sauce, maintain it vertically (so the sauce is dripping off it). Then use your finger to attract a line throughout it – it ought to maintain briefly earlier than the sauce runs all the way down to cowl the road up. This implies the sauce is thick sufficient.
TIP: The sauce shouldn’t be very thick – it thickens extra when cheese is added and once more when baked.
Loads of sauce – as a result of no one likes stodgy pasta bakes!
As with all my pasta bakes, I make extra sauce than most recipes as a result of I like my pasta bakes to come back out of the oven molten and effervescent, smothered with sauce slightly than a dried up stodgy block which you could minimize like cake. No thanks!!! I need THIS ↓↓↓
What to serve with Chicken Tetrazzini
I’d strongly urge you so as to add a aspect of greens – have a flick through my Vegetable Sides (newly organised by vegetable!).
Then in the event you’re going all out, add a aspect of Garlic Bread or if you wish to blow the cheese-meter, add a aspect of Tacky Garlic Bread.
For dessert, strive Tiramisu if you wish to preserve with the Italian theme, or in the event you’re going for a comfy Winter meal, make a pudding! Strive one in every of these:
Winter Puddings and Cosy Dessert ideas
Get pleasure from! – Johnsat x
Watch learn how to make it
Ingredients
- 500g / 1lb spaghetti or other long pasta, cooked per packet (penne, macaroni, ziti ok too) (Note 1)
- 2 tbsp (30g) butter
- 500g / 1lb chicken thighs , skinless boneless (Note 2)
- 4 tbsp (60g) butter , unsalted
- 500g / 1lb mushrooms , sliced 1/2 cm / 1/5" thick
- 2 garlic cloves , minced
- 1 onion , finely chopped
- 4 tbsp flour
- 2 cups milk , any fat, any type
- 1 cup cream , heavy / thickened (sub more milk)
- 2 cups chicken stock/broth , low sodium (or water + 2 stock cubes)
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
- 1 tsp salt
- 2 cups cheese , shredded (cheddar, jack, colby – not mozz)
Instructions
- Melt 2 tbsp butter in a large pot over high heat. Add chicken, sprinkle with pinch of salt and pepper. Cook 1 1/2 minutes until golden.
- Turn chicken, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Cook 1 minute until golden then remove onto plate – doesn't need to be fully cooked (will cook more in oven).
- Rest 5 minutes, then chop into small pieces, or shred.
- Preheat oven to 160°C / 325°F.
- Cook mushrooms: Melt 4 tbsp butter over high heat in the same pot. Add mushrooms and cook for 4 minutes until starting to go floppy but not yet golden.
- Add onion: Add garlic and onion, cook for 3 minutes until mushrooms are golden. Add a pinch of salt and pepper halfway through.
- Add flour & milk: Turn heat down to medium. Add flour. Stir for 30 seconds. Add milk and stir for 10 seconds or until it thickens (see video at 52 sec).
- Add cream and broth: Add chicken stock, cream, 1 tsp salt and 1/2 tsp pepper. Stir, then let the mixture heat up, stirring every now and then so it doesn't catch on the base, and cook until the sauce thickens enough so you can draw a path on the back of the spoon (video at 1.04). Do not make it very thick – it gets thicker in next steps.
- Add cheese & pasta: Turn stove off. Stir through half the cheese (will melt in oven), then add pasta and chicken. Toss to mix, taste and add more salt if needed.
- Bake: Pour into 23 x 33cm / 9 x 13" pan, smooth surface. Top with remaining cheese. Bake 25 minutes until golden and bubbly. Serve immediately!
Notes
1. Pasta – risoni/orzo and other tiny pasta won’t create enough volume for this recipe, Either use this recipe, or cook double the amount of pasta.
2. Chicken – thighs best because they stay juicier in things like pasta bakes where they’re cooked for longer than ideal. Breast and tenderloin fine too.
Can also use store bought rotisserie / roast chicken but sauce flavour won’t be as good – dissolving golden bits on base of pan from searing chicken (“fond”) adds extra flavour into sauce.
3. Cool pasta = absorbs less sauce while in oven, so pasta doesn’t bloat and you don’t end up with a thick, sauceless pasta bale.
4. Substitutions for creamy sauce ingredients:
Butter – sub margarine. Sub with olive oil + switch 1 cup of the milk for cream (if you can, to make up richness/flavour). Butter is flavour, so try not to skip this.
Flour – any type of flour fine here, white, wholemeal, self raising, gluten free. Cornflour/cornstarch gluten free sub: Mix 3.5 tbsp with splash of water and add that in with the milk. And obviously, use GF pasta!
Milk – any type. Dairy, non dairy, full fat, low fat, fresh, long life, milk powder (reconstituted). Up to 1.5 cups milk can be substituted with water.
Stock/bouillon powder or cube or seasoning instead of liquid stock/broth – use 2 cubes or 4 tsp powder, chicken or vegetable (Vegeta is my fave). Sub with 1/2 cup extra parmesan + salt to taste.
No cheese? Add 3/4 cup / 75g shredded parmesan, or 1 – 1.5 tsp chicken stock powder.
5. Leftovers – Store in the fridge for up to 4 days, reheat in microwave. Keeps better than most pasta bakes because this is saucier so you don’t end up with sad dried up stodgy leftovers.
6. Make ahead / freezing: Toss hot pasta with dab of butter of drizzle of oil (stops it bloating), then let it cool. Make sauce, cool, toss with pasta and assemble pasta bake. Fridge 4 days or freezer 3 months, thaw then bake 40 minutes loosely covered with foil (remove for last 10 min). OR bake from frozen – foil covered for 50 minutes or until centre is piping hot, then remove cover and bake until cheese has golden spots.
7. Nutrition per serving. Cut 60 calories by switching cream for more milk, cut a further 75 calories by switching the cheese with 1 cup parmesan cheese (stronger flavour so you need less).
Did You Make This Recipe?
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