Asian Chicken Salad

Here is an Asian chicken salad, my very special recipe, made with cooked butternut squash, red bell pepper, carrots and purple cabbage.

This is the second recipe in my 2-part series with my with friends from Hilton Home2 where I got to make easy, calorie-conscious recipes in the room.  Today, it’s an Asian chicken salad recipe!

One of my favorite projects to-date because I got to bring along my best friend, Max!

Max is “all of us” in any family photo.

Shown here resting before his on-camera debut.

One of everyone’s favorite go-to meals is chicken salad. It’s the “king” of the Thanksgiving leftover meals because it’s darn easy to make and gets the job done in terms of filling you up. The only thing – it gets kinda “meh” after about 2 servings.

Well, here’s a version that’s lighter on the fat calories, relying on Greek yogurt instead of mayo, and heavy on flavor and vitamins, taking a spin on a Thai peanut salad. I tossed in butternut squash because, well…fall is here.

You can buy all of these ingredients packaged and fresh at a local grocery store so you can easily assemble them while you’re away from your home kitchen.

First, you will need to cook the zucchini in the microwave to make them crispy. When they cool, cut them into small pieces and mix with the other ingredients for the sauce. Made a sauce with 2% Greek yogurt, no-salt-added peanut butter, low sodium soy sauce, ginger paste, lime juice  or rice vinegar, and red peppers.

Remove the skin from cooked chicken and pull apart the meat with a fork. Add the other ingredients into the bowl, along with the chicken and mix together.

Add sauce to the chicken salad, mix and garnish with some fresh cilantro and 2 tablespoons of crushed, unsalted peanuts. Enjoy your homemade Chinese chicken salad.

Boom, indeed.