Corned beef casserole is a great use for leftover corned beef or venison. Add noodles, cabbage, peas, cheese and breadcrumbs and it’s a winner. If you really want to sex things up, make your own cream of “chicken” soup with homemade stock. But you don’t have to.

Obviously you can use canned cream of chicken soup, but I dislike canned “cream of” soups, so I always make my own. They’re not difficult.

I first saw recipes for corned beef casserole in a wonderfully odd book called the Pine to Prairie Cookbook. The book is loaded with recipes from regular folks from Minnesota and North Dakota, and while there are doozies in there, the corned beef casserole looked genuinely good.

At least in structure and concept. This recipe is my own rendition, adjusted to work with both wild and farmed ingredients.

Now there is a thing called a Reuben casserole, which is similar to this, but not the same. Basically that dish is a Reuben sandwich deconstructed and put into a casserole dish. Seems a little weird to me, especially the idea of cooked thousand island dressing.

Another style of corned beef casserole is explicitly for St. Patrick’s Day. That one has corned beef, cabbage and potatoes. Obvi, right?

This one is a hybrid, more Midwestern. I use broken up corned venison, which is basically the same as corned beef, fresh cabbage sauteed with onion in butter, frozen peas, wide German egg noodles, cheese, rye breadcrumbs and a homemade “cream of” soup.

Homemade ‘Cream of’ Soup

OK, yes, you can use canned cream of chicken or cream of celery for this corned beef casserole. I won’t hate you, and it does save time. But homemade is so much better.

Basically a “cream of” soup is either a bisque or veloute. A wha? OK, so a veloute is a French mother sauce. It’s typically a flour-and-butter roux to which stock is added, then finished with a little cream. You can add other elements to it, as well. In this case mustard.

Making it is as simple as making a roux, slowly pouring in stock, in this case chicken or grouse or pheasant or quail stock, bringing it to a simmer, mixing in some Dijon mustard, then adding a little cream at the end.

This becomes the sauce for the corned beef casserole.

Building a Corned Beef Casserole

Like most casseroles or hotdishes, you build them in blocks, mix together, then bake.

In this case, you saute chopped cabbage and onion in butter, add to this frozen peas and broken up corned beef or venison, mix with partially cooked egg noddles and shredded cheese, then stir in the sauce.

Pack into a casserole, top with more cheese and buttered breadcrumbs, then bake.

I really like rye breadcrumbs here because rye likes corned beef. A lot. But regular breadcrumbs are fine.

Serving and Storing

Serve your corned beef casserole with a green salad, or some lightly cooked vegetables, like sauteed carrots or greens. Keep it light.

Once made, the casserole keeps a week in the fridge and it can be frozen. I like to reheat small portions in a covered pan on the stovetop set on medium-low, or you can reheat the whole dish in a 350°F oven for about 30 minutes.

Looking for more casseroles? I got ’em. Try my tater tot venison hotdish, my Italian style casserole, or my sauerkraut casserole, which is basically German lasagna.

If you liked this recipe, please leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ rating and a comment below; I’d love to hear how everything went. If you’re on Instagram, share a picture and tag me at huntgathercook.