Family Suppers

By Shake 'N  Bake / General Foods Corporation 1980

 
This particular recipe booklet isn't super vintage, but hey, 25 years old still counts. The booklet contains mostly recipes for chicken with an occasional recipe using pork.
I have honestly never bought Shake 'N Bake in my life. I remember my mother making it on occasion and I remember her letting me do the shaking every now and then. What can I say, cheap thrills.
So, this is my introduction to Shake 'N Bake:

Yep! Taco Chicken!

I consider myself lucky that the two main ingredients in this recipe (besides the chicken) are still available, and in their original form. It is a common problem when using vintage cookbooks to find that an ingredient is no longer on the market or that the size of the product has been reduced drastically. (You ought to see how huge regular rolls of toilet paper used to be in the day. But I digress.) Here we go:

1 cup taco-flavor tortilla chips (read: Doritos)
1 envelope Shake 'N Bake Seasoned Coating Mix for Chicken - Barbecue Style
2 1/2 pounds cut-up chicken
1/2 cup shredded cheddar cheese

Place chips in shaker bag and crush finely. (Note: make them really fine so they don't sink to the bottom.) Add the Shake 'N Bake: shake to blend. Prepare, coat, and bake chicken as directed on package. Sprinkle with cheese and bake 5 minutes longer, or until cheese has melted. Serve with shredded lettuce, if desired. (I couldn't think of one reason why I would desire this, so I skipped it.)
Makes 4 servings 

I used 5 chicken thighs so for me it was 5 servings. There was plenty of the mix so no problem. As you can see, this is a really easy recipe. Great for evenings when you don't have a lot of prep time available to you. This turned out really great. One bad thing...all those leftover Doritos in the bag calling out to me!

Next up...

Pizza Chicken

I like pizza. I like chicken. Win-win, I figure.

1 envelope Shake 'N Bake Seasoned Coating Mix for Chicken - Barbecue Style
1 teaspoon oregano
2 1/2 pounds cut-up chicken
3/4 cup shredded mozzarella cheese

Place Shake 'N Bake and oregano in the shaker bag; shake to blend. Prepare, coat, and bake chicken as directed on package. Sprinkle with cheese and bake 5 minutes longer, or until cheese has melted. Do not spoon pan drippings over chicken. Makes 4 servings.

I, once again, used chicken thighs. (All out of those now.) Once again, easy. Unfortunately, not as good as the Taco Chicken. Contrary to the recipe's name. It tasted nothing like pizza. The small amount of oregano just wasn't enough to compete with the overpowering barbecue flavors. I even used a brand new bottle of very fresh, very fragrant oregano. Don't get me wrong. The chicken was good, but I might just as well have made the chicken just as directed on the box.

So.. I recommend trying the Taco Chicken. It's easy and it's a different take on the plain barbecue style Shake 'N Bake