I make faux-shake-and-bake-type chicken often, varying the seasoning and/or sauce I coat the chicken with before breading it with plain breadcrumbs. It’s just so easy, and we both like the result, so it’s in the regular meal rotation. I use plain breadcrumbs because real, packaged Shake & Bake or its store-brand equivalents are much too salty for me, which is unfortunate because I have a packet of that left in my pantry from way back when I was unaware of this fact. The box I bought came with two seasoning packets and after using the first one I stuffed the second one far into the pantry, because I wasn’t ever going to do that to my tastebuds and blood pressure again.

But, in the spirit of using it up, and not throwing it out, I took a huge risk and used it to coat some chicken tonight. Why, you cry, would I do that after I just said how much it sucked? Well, I cut it with regular breadcrumbs to try and mitigate the salt factor. Because the packaged stuff was seasoned (“Parmesan crusted”), I skipped my usual dip of the chicken in salad dressing and used a beaten egg to moisten the chicken pieces instead.

To go with it, I added some Stovetop stuffing. I bought a can of the stuff a while ago, instead of a box, because a whole box is always too much and we always throw some out. The idea of making only what I needed appealed to me. I keep forgetting it’s there, though. It’s always very salty too, so despite my desire to bump up the stuffing flavor with the chicken broth in the fridge, I used plain water to make it.

Toss in some roasted sweet potatoes seasoned with the powder at the bottom of a jar of Mrs Dash, and you’ve got dinner.