The other night Mom made a huge bowl of chicken salad for dinner. We ate it with some on-the-vine tomatoes she picked up at Brookshire’s. It was such a “spring-y” meal even though it was just under 50 degrees.
She used leftover chicken, blueberries, chopped celery and celery leaves, green onions and mayo. Mom is a Dukes’s Mayo girl. It was so good the three of us ate the entire bowl.
I always like something sweet in my chicken salad. Over the years I’ve also used blueberries, grapes, strawberries, apples, pears, pineapple, dried cranberries and other dried fruit. Not all at the same time of course.
Sometimes I use toasted pecans or other toasted nuts. I think pecans are my favorite.
Some people add chopped boiled eggs to their chicken salad (and tuna salad) but I can’t stand eggs — especially boiled — so I never add any.
I got a “recipe” for cooking chicken specifically for chicken salad from Sara Moulton who used to be on the Food Network and PBS. She was Julia Child’s protégé.
And Helen Zapata is going to like this “recipe” because there are only two ingredients: chicken and water. She teases me that some of the recipes I share have a long list of things to buy. But then again, she teases me about everything.
All you do is place as many raw chicken breasts as you need into a heavy-bottomed stockpot. Fill the pot with water and bring to a boil on the stove. Boil two minutes and then cover the pot with a tight-fitting lid and turn off the heat. Do not open the pot until the water has cooled. You won’t believe how tender the chicken gets doing it this way.
So what do you like to put in your chicken salad? I have a feeling I will be making more very soon since we pigged all of ours down the other night. I won’t be able to use pineapple though because of Mom.
And speaking of pineapple, I had a dream about a former coworker, Emma Jean, the other night and it made me think of another recipe that only has a few ingredients, so it is also Helen Zapata approved.
Emma Jean used to bring either Cherry Pineapple Dump Cake or Sex in a Pan to our food-related work events. The cherry/pineapple one was so good. I think it would be a good Easter dessert. And Easer is only a month away.
Cherry Pineapple Dump Cake
20 oz can crushed pineapple with juice
21 oz can cherry pie filling
1 box yellow cake mix
1 stick butter
½ cup chopped pecans
Preheat oven to 35o. Dump can of crushed pineapple with juice into a 9x13 baking dish.
Dump can of cherry pie filling over the pineapple and spread evenly.
Dump one box yellow cake mix over the top of the cherries and spread out to cover.
Chop one stick of butter into squares and spread evenly over the cake mix. This makes a nice crust.
Spread the pecans evenly over all.
Bake at 35o for 35-45 minutes.
Usually served cold or at room temperature, but I’ll bet it would be good served warm over vanilla ice cream.
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