A beautiful breeze helps cool down the hot days we have been having. This warm weather is the perfect time of year for a cool meal. Here is an easy lunch or dinner recipe that your family will call yummy. Aunt Rose's Apple Chicken Salad is great on a sandwich, in a wrap, with chips or just on its own. Make ahead and bring it to your 4th of July picnic. Perfect idea for using up leftover chicken.
This apple family recipe should make enough to fill 4 to 6 wraps. Keep it totally gluten free by serving with potato chips, rice crackers or in a coconut wrap. For a vegan version, use chic peas instead of chicken and swap the mayo and Greek yogurt for store bought or homemade vegan mayo. In our house we need a vegan and chicken version, which is real easy to do with this recipe.
Adding leftover grilled chicken is a win win. The dressing in this apple chicken salad recipe will bring moisture back into your chicken and the grilled flavor will be a tasty addition to this already delicious recipe. You can also cook fresh chicken. To save time buy a rotisserie chicken or use precooked chicken if you want to make this dish really quick and easy. The 6 oz bag of chicken in the photo below made filled one cup when chopped. For a full recipe of Aunt Roses's Chicken Salad you will need to purchase 2 bags.
Start by chopping & measuring the carrots, celery and walnuts.
If you are making the vegan version, strain your chic peas and whip up the vegan mayo and add the local NY honey, salt and pepper to it.
For Aunt Rose's traditional version combine mayo, Greek yogurt, honey, apple cider vinegar, salt and pepper.
Chop and measure your chicken and apples while your bread is toasting or wrap is heating. Depending on the size of your apple, each apple should yield about a cup chopped. This is another opportunity for the apple peal challenge. If you are making both the traditional and vegan apple chicken salad mix the walnuts, carrots, celery and apples together then divide in half and dress separately.
Mix the ingredients together and create sandwich or pack away in the fridge to take with you to a picnic party.
Here is the full recipe for Aunt Rose's Apple Chicken Salad
Ingredients:
2 cups chopped cooked chicken (vegan option use 1 can chic peas)
2 cups chopped apples
1/2 cup chopped walnuts
1 cup diced celery
1 cup diced carrots
1/2 cup mayo (vegan version use vegan mayo)
1/2 cup Greek yogurt (vegan version use vegan mayo)
1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar (not needed for vegan version)
1 tablespoon honey
1/2 teaspoon pepper
1/4 teaspoon salt
bread, chips, crackers, or wraps (gluten-free use a coconut wrap)
Process:
Chop and measure the walnuts, carrots & celery.
Mix together mayo, yogurt, apple cider vinegar, honey, salt and pepper. (for vegan version no need for apple cider vinegar because it is already in your mayo)
Chop and measure apples and chicken.
Put all of the ingredients in a big bowl and stir.
Give it a taste and add more seasoning till it suits your fancy.
If you are using a traditional wrap, heat up in a frying pan on high heat before filling. If you are using bread we would recommend to toast first. Gluten-free coconut wraps work really well for this recipe and they shouldn't be heated. Potato chips and rice crackers are another great option to serve this apple chicken salad with.
Time to dig in!
We hope your family loves Aunt Rose's Apple Chicken Salad as much as we do. This was a favorite item in the menu at the Big Apple Cafe at our pick your own apple farm located in Modena, NY. Let us know what you think and feel free to share your food photos on our facebook page.