What could be better? Oh, the cheese component of course!
I love casseroles in winter, and the thought of vegetables with bacon and cheese got to me so I created this dish.
Preheat your oven to 375 C. While the oven was heating, I browned a pound of bacon that I cut into bite-sized pieces, and drained off the fat.
In a medium saucepan, begin melting about a quarter cup of butter or margarine over medium-high heat. Add a quarter of a cup of flour to make a roux for the cheese sauce.
To make a roux, which is a thickener for sauces and gravies, use equal amounts of fat and flour.
Make sure to cook down the flour for several minutes to get rid of the starchy taste. It should look something like this picture:
If you don’t cook the flour for a few minutes, your sauce or gravy will have a starchy taste to it. The longer you cook it, the darker the colour it will have. For this recipe, we want golden, not dark brown.
Slowly add in two cups of milk. When I use a roux, I use regular 2% milk instead of heavy cream. If you have richer taste buds, feel free to use cream instead. Once the mixture is smooth, add two cups of grated cheese. I used Havarti for this recipe, but your favourite cheese would be fine.
Once the milk has been added and the mixture is smooth, add the cheese and stir until blended.
Once your cheese sauce is ready, peel and dice four to six potatoes; enough to cover the bottom of a 9 x 13 casserole dish. Add one roughly chopped onion.
Dice the potatoes and roughly chop the onions to start. Aim for bite-sized pieces.
Next, I added broccoli and red pepper. With a recipe like this, you can use any vegetables that you enjoy eating. Keep in mind the cooking time for potatoes, and try to make sure your veggies are cut into pieces that will hold up to it. Add the cooked bacon, and mix well.
Add your vegetables and the bacon. Mix well so they’re evenly distributed in the casserole dish.
Pour your cheese sauce over the entire dish, allowing it to fill in the spaces.
Pour the cheese sauce evenly over the vegetable and bacon mixture. It’s not necessary to mix it again since the sauce will fill in the empty spaces.
For the topping, I used a mixture of Havarti and mozzarella cheeses. Havarti becomes very creamy when melted, and I wanted a bit more body to the cheese topping. If you’re a fan of breadcrumbs on casseroles, this would be a good time to use them.
I used a blend of cheeses for the topping so it would have some body to it. Bake for 45 minutes, or until potatoes are fork-tender.
You might be wondering why I didn’t add my usual pile of spices to this casserole. Cheeses are very salty, so I didn’t want to add extra salt to the mix. Havarti has a nice pungent flavour to it, so I wanted the flavour of the cheese and the vegetables to stand alone, and stand alone they did.
The finished product! The fresh taste of all the vegetables, with the smoky flavours of the bacon and the Havarti cheese! This was a winner!
I really enjoyed this dish, and will definitely make it again with different cheeses and different vegetable combinations!
That indeed is cheesy! I love this
Thank you very much!!
Hmmmmm…. another GREAT recipe to try, Tami! Thank you so much for sharing. This really looks excellent!
It was sinfully delicious Raani… even better the next day for lunch!! LOL xo
Hi,
No joke, looking at your pictures always make me hungry. Another great idea and the nice thing is that I love cheese. Now all I have to do is figure out a way to get you over here to prepare it for me.
Great receipt, Tami. I read it and thought one of these days, I might try it. But I’ll wait until you bring them all out in a receipt book.
Have a good one.
Ciao,
Patti
Thank you so much for the wonderful compliments Patti! I would LOVE to fly over and cook you a wonderful meal!
Love you! xoxo
Now this is something I can bite into to. Looks scrump-didi-o-licious! Great photolog Tami!
Thanks Liz! You could even leave out the bacon easily because it was so flavourful!!
xoxo
This looks like a great recipe. I am going to try it exactly as it is but instead I am going to use cauliflower.
It would be great with cauliflower too! If you like sweet potatoes, they would really go nicely with the cauliflower… then ham instead of bacon… mmmmm now you have me thinking!! LOL
I really like this cheesy treat, yum
Made some last weekend
Great! I’m glad you enjoyed it, and honoured you tried it!!
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