Chicken Salad

I love good crock pot recipes. Especially the cheap and easy ones where you don't have to brown any meat before hand. That's the good life, right there.

I hate crock pot recipes that are cheap and easy but then they don't taste good. What the heck am I supposed to do with six slightly dry chicken breasts covered in pineapple.  Would I be a terrible person if I just threw away perfectly edible but offensively bland food? Yes. Yes I would. It would literally keep me up at night.  So I wiped off the pineapple and made chicken salad. If only mayonnaise could fix all of life's problems.

You don't have to go through a terrible crock pot attempt to make chicken salad. Get some chicken breasts and boil them until tender. Or one of those rotisserie chickens they sellat the front of the stores. Then shred 'er up.

The only other heat involving element is toasting pine nuts. I just heat them on an ungreased skillet until they are brown, stirring constantly. It takes like five minutes. Do not walk away from the stove. Do not burn them. DO NOT WALK AWAY FROM THE STOVE. Once you see how much they are you will understand.

Turns out I make ugly food. It tastes good, though.  I have even made these for a wedding shower. I folded flour tortilla halves into cones and filled them up with the chicken salad.  People thought I bought them even though I completely forgot to toast the pine nuts. Opps. Picture to come (maybe, probably not) of the wrapped chicken salad, it was a lot prettier.

Chicken Salad
Serves 8

• 6 cups shredded, cooked chicken
• 1/2 cup mayonnaise (or more)
• 1/2 teaspoon dry mustard powder
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• pepper to taste
• 2 celery stalks, sliced and diced
• 1 cup dried cranberries
• 3/4 cup pine nuts, toasted

Add chicken, mayonnaise, mustard powder, salt and pepper to a large bowl and combine with a fork.

Add the rest of the ingredients. Stir and combine with a fork. Once all the ingredient are combined, add more mayonnaise if desired.

Refrigerate for 1 hour before serving.  Serve cool on top of mixed greens, toasted bread, or croissant. 

Next time: Make my own mayonnaise. How hard could it be?