Wednesday, April 18, 2012

Quick Dinner and Easy Lunch


I'm busy. As I'm sure most of you out there are. I have three kiddos that I home school. The boy is 13 and that in itself will leave your brain blistered. Add teenage-itis to the list of activities of said teenager, coupled with the activities of two adolescent girls and you're running around like a chicken with it's head cut off.

Speaking of headless chickens...today's recipe is for Chicken Salad. See what I did there? I saw this recipe on Pinterest and knew it was for me. The original recipe looked flavorful and textureful (I realize that's not a word) and I could adapt it for my kids who don't have the same sophisticated palate as I. *pinkies up everyone* (forgive the very unfancy way I plated this sandwich. I was starving from working out and this was around 9:00 at night)

Chicken salad makes me feel cozy and warm and reminds me of my childhood. One of my favorite meals my mom used to make was chicken salad and rice. When I describe this you may feel disgusted and think I'm insane, but it was so good and I've never tried to recreate it for my family for fear of getting it all wrong and disappointing myself.

She would boil a whole chicken and once it was done and cooled, she'd take it off the bone, add magic to it and also eggs and leave it in the fridge while she cooked the rice and gravy from the broth. Then we'd fill our plates with rice, chicken salad and thin broth gravy over all of it and eat away. It seems we always did this on Sunday nights because with this memory I have the memory of the 60 Minutes theme and the panic I'd feel when I heard this theme song because inevitably I'd always have homework I'd forgotten to do. I still get the same panic feeling when I hear it today. But I digress...

My chicken salad recipe is different from hers. There are no eggs involved. Now that I'm a grown up, it's hard for me to reconcile eating a dish where there are adult dead chickens and baby dead chicken in the same meal. It skeeves me out in a way no words can express. Although, Mom, if you wanna make that dish for me sometime I won't fuss.

This chicken salad is simple and delicious. I made this as easy as I could because last night I had to take the girls to their competition cheer class, drop off some brownies for a customer, pick the girls up, and go to the gym. Believe it or not, it wasn't one of my busier days.

So I used canned chicken! *GASP* Don't hate me. It was actually good. But if you don't like that idea, just use chicken breast cooked the way you like them. I think grilled or broiled would be nice in this.

I used two cans. One can for the kids and Danny's and the other for me. Danny ended up eating mine because there wasn't enough to go around of the plain. Everyone loved their chicken salad too! When I came home from the gym, they all raved about it.

Drain your canned chicken and put in a bowl. For the plain one, I added green onion, celery, mayonnaise, and salt and pepper. Mixed it up and stick it in the fridge.

For the fancy one, I added all the same ingredients as the plain one, but added some chopped apple, chopped grapes and toasted pecans. Let me tell you something. IT. WAS. FANCY. I served it on croissants and I felt like I was in heaven. The different flavors and textures bursting in my mouth was a dream. I'm not ashamed to tell you I moaned more than once while eating this.

In fact, I was looking forward to eating this for lunch and saved one croissant for myself, only to wake up this morning and find out one of my kids snatched it for breakfast. Little crumb snatchers. I had to have an internal conversation reminding myself it's not the end of the world. And how could I be mad at her when she so sweetly climbed into my bed this morning telling me in great detail the lovely breakfast she had of croissant and warm butter? She's a girl after my own heart.

I hope you try this one, either for an easy dinner or a quick lunch. I, myself may make this on a weekly basis just to keep on hand on days when I want to feel fancy. Who wouldn't like that?

CHICKEN SALAD

2 cans of chicken (or a pack of chicken breast, cooked to your liking)
2 green onions, chopped
1 celery stalk, chopped
3/4 cup mayonnaise
salt and pepper to taste

ADD-INS

1/2 cup chopped apple
1 cup chopped grapes
1/2 cup toasted pecans, walnuts, or cashews

Stay fancy friends and serve on croissants.

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