Creamy Italian Chicken

I've been watching my friend Emily's kids while she's temporarily working full time. I threw this in the crock pot the other day for her, and it looked & smelt wonderful all day. I'm making this tomorrow, so I'll let you know how it turns out!

4 boneless skinless chicken breast halves
1 envelope dry Italian salad dressing mix
1/2 cup margarine or butter, cubed
8 ounces cream cheese, softened
1 can cream of chicken soup, undiluted
4 ounces can mushroom stems and pieces, drained
Hot cooked rice or pasta

Place the chicken breast halves and butter in the crock pot. Sprinkle the Italian mix over the chicken. Cover; cook on low for 3-4 hours

Remove chicken and shred.

In the crock pot, combine the cream cheese and soup until smooth and blended (you don't need to drain the liquid). Stir in mushroom pieces. Add chicken back to crock pot. Cook for another 30-45 minutes, or until heated through. Serve over hot cooked rice or pasta.

If you're using frozen chicken breasts, add an hour or so to the cooking time.

So after making this, I thought that it was pretty good. I did make a few changes though.

8 oz of cream cheese seemed like a lot to me, so I only used 4 oz cream cheese and then about the same amount of sour cream.

Also, when I pulled the chicken out to shred it, I was surprised at how much liquid there was, so I drained that off, and ended up adding about 1/2 cup back into the sauce. I like my sauce thick... like the consistency of glue. So you may want to add more of the juice back in depending on the consistency that you like.

And I didn't add any mushrooms... I totally forgot about them.

I also thought this was fairly salty ~ and I didn't add any salt at all. I'll try using low sodium ingredients next time to see if that helps.