While I’m not anti-mayonnaise, I am anti-super-large-quantities-of-mayonnaise. For the longest time, this meant I never ate most southern “salads” including chicken salad. About a year ago though, I stumbled across a Cooking Light chicken salad recipe that mainly uses greek yogurt. Now that was right up my alley! I gave it a go and my adaptation is now my go-to chicken salad recipe. We’ll often make a big batch of it on the weekend and eat it for lunches throughout the week, or serve it up as a snack or appetizer to guests.
Prep Time: 15 minutes | Serves: about 8 servings as a main item or 12 servings as a snack or side item
Ingredients
- 1 rotisserie chicken
- 1/4 cup light mayonnaise
- 3/4 cup plain greek yogurt
- 1 tbpsn fresh lemon juice (about 1/2 lemon)
- 1 tbpn white wine vinegar
- 1 tsp honey
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 1/2 tsp freshly ground black pepper
- 1/3 cup chopped celery
- 1/3 cup dried cranberries
- 2 oz / 7 tbpsn sliced almonds
Directions
Remove the skin and bones from the rotisserie chicken and shred the white and dark meat into a large bowl. Be careful to avoid small bones and cartilage (no one wants to accidentally bite down on those).
In a separate bowl, whisk together the mayo, yogurt, lemon juice, vinegar, honey, salt and black pepper. Pour this over the shredded chicken. Add celery, cranberries, and almonds. Mix until well combined.
Chill until ready to serve.
Serving Note: If you haven’t tried chicken salad on top of cucumber slices, you’re missing out. Assuming you like cucumbers, that’s an absolutely delicious and cheap way to serve up your chicken salad – especially in the summer!
Adaptions
- I use a rotisserie chicken because it’s easy. However, you could certainly roast your own chicken if you have time. You could also put about 3 large chicken breasts in a crock pot for 6-8 hours (shred once done) if you’d prefer an all white meat chicken salad.
- Not a fan of cranberries? Give sliced grapes a try. They’d add a similar sweetness.
- Sub pecans or walnuts for the almonds if you like those better.