Mom's Chicken Salad

The humble and ordinary chicken salad mom made gets lifted up by the bread it's served on.


You all know how to make a basic chicken salad I am sure, that's just homemaking 101. This gives me the opportunity to speak with you all about "waste not, want not." Plus, this sandwich seemed not so basic and tasted so much better because of the bread it was served on.
My mother and grandmother were good examples for not wasting food and that has carried over with me and my family. So, imagine my horror when my husband (back when we were dating and he had invited me and my two children for supper) tossed out about one third of a pot roast. Yikes! Suffice to say he's learned from me that left overs can be made into some other delicious meal.

What is so good about a roasted chicken is taking the left overs and making soup, or as I did, this chicken salad recipe I grew up on. The chicken we got for $6.72 gave us a roasted chicken dinner and now plenty of chicken salad for him to take sandwiches to work. You can get even more creative with chicken left overs, by trying Chicken & Mushrooms over Biscuits which I posted just a bit ago. Instead of fresh chicken used in that recipe use the cooked chicken instead and your left over chicken gravy. That's just another economical way to make another meal.

 If you are watching your grocery dollars you can find various left over make over meals here at Cooking On A Budget.  I've done quite a few using pot roasted or roasted beef and even pork. Should you need help with ideas for using your left-overs, I'll be happy to help. Just leave a comment or shoot me an e-mail and I'll get back to you as soon as I can.

Our store had a sale on ciabatta bread this weekend and that's what I used to make our sandwiches today. Normally we have a generic wheat bread and as a kid it was generally white bread - well the chicken salad is fine on those breads but on the ciabatta it's awesome. Ciabatta has great flavor and texture and the chicken salad seemed to taste so much better, evidenced by my husband exclaiming it was the best chicken salad sandwich he's ever eaten.

So here with, the frugal, the humble homemaking 101 way of making chicken salad. (My Mom's version)
  • 4 cups cooked and cubed chicken
  • 1 cup celery - small dice
  • 3/4 cup onion - small dice
  • 3/4 cup mayonnaise
  • salt and black pepper to taste
  • ciabatta bread
  1. Separate your cooked chicken from the bones if using a roasted chicken and cut it up into small bite-sized pieces and place it in a good sized bowl.
  2. Dice up your celery and onion and set aside.
  3. Salt and pepper the chicken and toss around to distribute the spices.
  4. Add in the celery and onion and mayonnaise and mix until the chicken is coated.
  5. Slice your bread into sandwich size sections, then lengthwise in half. Fill with the salad and if you have them, add slices of tomato. 
 

If you want to check out my Chicken and Grape Salad recipe, just follow the link.



                                                                          

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