It is dark by dinnertime again. Practice runs late, homework is spread across the table, and nobody wants a recipe that starts with a shopping list as long as the school supply one.
So I went through the casseroles on this site and counted. These seven have seven ingredients or fewer on the recipe card, counted exactly as printed, salt and pepper included. The only thing I left out is the cooking spray for the dish. Three of them need just six.
Every one makes six servings, and they run from 4 to 8 WW Points per serving on their recipe cards. Swap a brand or add a topping and the Points change, so check your app if you improvise.
1. Buffalo Chicken Pasta Bake
Six ingredients: pasta, cooked shredded chicken, light cream cheese, light ranch dressing, Frank’s hot sauce, and reduced-fat shredded cheese. That is the whole list.
The cream cheese, ranch, and hot sauce get beaten together into a creamy, spicy sauce. Half the cheese is stirred in and the rest melts on top for the last five minutes. Forty minutes start to finish, and if the heat is too much for your table, the post shows how to cut the Frank’s with water or chicken broth.
2. Pepperoni Pizza Pasta Bake
Six ingredients: pasta, pasta sauce, pizza sauce, Italian seasoning, pepperoni, and reduced-fat mozzarella. It is pizza night and pasta night in one dish.
Half the pepperoni gets chopped and mixed into the pasta. The other half goes on top with the cheese, so it comes out of the oven looking like a pizza. It bakes twenty minutes under foil and fifteen without. For the weeks that really get away from you, bake a few in aluminum pans and keep them in the freezer.
3. Turkey Sloppy Joe Pasta Bake
Six ingredients: ground turkey, diced onion, diced green pepper, a can of Manwich, macaroni, and reduced-fat shredded cheese.
This one was written for back-to-school season. Brown the turkey, boil the macaroni, stir both together with the sauce, onion, and pepper, and cover it with cheese. A serving is one heaping cup. It also works as a freezer meal, and the post explains how to cook it straight from frozen.
4. Buffalo Chicken Casserole
Seven ingredients: a 7.5 oz package of biscuits, light cream cheese, cooked shredded chicken, Frank’s hot sauce, light ranch dressing, light shredded cheese, and five slices of bacon.
Cut the biscuits into pieces and spread them over the bottom of the dish. The creamy buffalo chicken goes on by the spoonful, and the cheese and crumbled bacon go on for the last ten minutes. On a calmer night you can assemble it up to 24 hours ahead, then bake it when everyone is finally home.
5. Chicken Alfredo Bubble Up
Seven lines on the ingredient list, and one of them is a dash of salt and pepper. The other six are a package of biscuits, frozen broccoli, cooked chicken breast, reduced-fat Alfredo sauce, light mozzarella, and a little asiago.
The broccoli cooks in the microwave, then gets mixed with the chicken, sauce, and mozzarella and spooned over the biscuit pieces. If your oven tends to leave the middle soft, you can pre-bake the dough for 5 minutes first. Add a side salad and dinner is done.
6. Chicken Parmesan Casserole
Seven ingredients, and one is optional: the cup of diced peppers. The rest are biscuits, cooked shredded chicken, shredded parmesan, grated parmesan, pasta sauce, and Italian seasoning.
The biscuit pieces get shaken in a bag with grated parmesan before they line the dish, so the parmesan bakes right into the biscuit layer. The saucy chicken goes on top, then more parmesan. It freezes well once it’s baked, so a second pan is worth the extra few minutes.
7. Cheesy Potato & Bacon Bake
The side dish of the list. Seven lines on the card: a can of Progresso light creamy potato with bacon and cheese soup, diced onion, diced peppers, frozen home fries, light grated cheese, four strips of bacon, and a dash of salt and pepper.
Prep is five minutes. Everything but the bacon is stirred together in one bowl, the bacon is crumbled on top, and it bakes for about an hour. Get it in the oven first and it takes care of itself while you handle the rest of dinner.
More Weight Watchers casseroles
When there is a little more time and a longer shopping list is fine, every casserole on the site, sorted by Points, lives in our Weight Watchers casseroles collection.
