Thank You: Joel for the helpful tips! : )

I do have recipe for a white sauce (well the Good Cooks Handbook from Good Housekeeping and yes, it was in there as you predicted) and I will definitly try that!

To answer your question, his lactose intolerace is very severe, a taste of a buttersctoch disc has an unpleasent reaction...poor guy!

I have found that the lactose free cheeses are hard to work with. I have used Veggie Shreads before as they are lower in calories and fat (I am always on a diet) and the mozzerella was the best as far as melting wize (use it on frech onion soup and you would never know the difference) the chedder is just blah! The Veggie slices are not bad, but can only be used in sandwiches.

But you did hit the nail on the head, all of the good casseroles are cream and cheese based and sadly, I never make any others, but I can try ; ) But really, what casserole have you made that hasn't called for cream of (insert veggie or meat)? LOL!

Thank you again for the suggestions!

Oh and I hope the weather clears up for you in NY! I follow the NY weather as I am a native NYer (born and raised in the Albany area and spent the past four years on LI) and I happened to notice on the radar that NY was just covered in a green blob of rain!

I am sure you have your bagels and pizza to comfort you though...lucky duck!

I love to cook and I love to help out my friends...I only wish I had someone to cook for me that first dreadful week. You are defintly presented with a lot of unknowns and one of them should not be what you are going to eat for dinner!