Curried Chicken Salad
Chicken salad is a dish I order for lunch at restaurants but rarely make at home. That's a shame, because whipping up homemade chicken salad is a snap. I was in a hurry last night and opened a can of chicken, which saves the cooking (and cooling!) time, so I was done even quicker.
Chicken salad is a dish I order for lunch at restaurants but rarely make at home. That's a shame, because whipping up homemade chicken salad is a snap. I was in a hurry last night and opened a can of chicken, which saves the cooking (and cooling!) time, so I was done even quicker.
- 1 tablespoon honey
- 2 teaspoons curry powder
- 1/2 teaspoon ginger ground
- 2 tablespoons lime juice fresh
- 1/4 cup golden raisins
- 1 14.5-ounce can chicken broth reduced-sodium
- 1 1/2 pounds chicken breast halves boneless skinless
- 2 ribs celery diced fine
- 1 each apple, cored and cut into 1/4-inch chunks optional
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise light
- 1/3 cup sour cream or plain greek yogurt light or nonfat
- 1 pinch salt to taste
- 1 pinch pepper freshly ground
- Carbohydrate 19.7614910543973 g
- Cholesterol 109.156340483876 mg
- Fat 12.167478278899 g
- Fiber 1.74979691867931 g
- Protein 43.5088871184973 g
- Saturated Fat 2.10309043416072 g
- Serving Size 1 1 Serving (401g)
- Sodium 1195.53065289112 mg
- Sugar 18.011694135718 g
- Trans Fat 8.99356431496948 g
- Calories 368 calories
Step-by-step
- The first step in making chicken salad is to cook the chicken. Many recipes call for boiling the chicken breasts in water, but that can lead to tasteless, dry chicken. I prefer to gently poach boneless, skinless breasts in chicken stock or broth.
- Simply season the chicken breasts with salt and pepper and place them into a shallow pan. Cover with chicken broth, then cover the pan and simmer for 10-15 minutes.
- The difference between a simmer and a boil is the bubbles. In boiling, there are large bubbles throughout the liquid; in simmering there are small bubbles around the edges of the pan.
- One other flavor trick I use is to cool the chicken in the broth. That keeps it extremely moist. The remaining ingredients are diced celery and apple, golden raisins and a dressing of mayonnaise and sour cream thats flavored with lime juice, honey, curry powder and ground ginger.
- The flavors of this dish really improve if you refrigerate it for several hours or overnight. Serve with toasted dark bread, wheat crackers or spread it on a croissant.
Boiling boneless chicken breasts in plain water strips them of natural juices. Poaching the meat in reduced-sodium chicken broth at a low simmer, characterized by tiny bubbles forming strictly around the edges of the pan, preserves moisture. Cooling the cooked chicken directly in that same warm broth adds extra hydration before dicing. When scaling this preparation up or down, maintain the ratio of mayonnaise to sour cream evenly at three parts to two. Multiplying the yield from four servings to eight requires doubling every spice measurement precisely, though honey and lime juice adjustments benefit from tasting near the end of mixing. Golden raisins and diced celery scale linearly without altering structural binding. Dairy-free variations substitute plain soy yogurt for sour cream while keeping the fat content comparable. Rest the finished mixture in the refrigerator for at least seven hours to let the curry powder fully bloom through the fat emulsion.
