August 17, 2008

Blue Cheese Chicken Salad

I went to a potluck picnic today. Whatever I was going to bring had to be substantial, moderately healthful, tasty, without hidden allergens and not likely to be duplicated. My rules, not theirs. It also had to be safe sitting out in temperatures in the high eighties. That ruled out my chicken salad with the blue cheese dressing.

Or did it? I've never been fond of mayonnaise as a dressing base (or anything else), and I thought this would be a great opportunity to eliminate it from this recipe. A couple of tweaks later, I couldn't be happier with the result.

Ingredients
3 chicken breasts
1 - 1.5 lb seedless red grapes
2 large Granny Smith apples
5 oz. soft blue cheese, crumbled
3 oz. sunflower seeds
salt and fresh pepper

Oil and liberally season the chicken, then grill it. You're going for good brown grill marks but not char. Once it's cooked through, let the chicken rest--ideally, overnight in the fridge.

Cube the chicken and the apples. Slice the grapes in half. Add the blue cheese, sunflower seeds and about another teaspoon of pepper. Stir. The juice from the fruit will start to break down the blue cheese and make a dressing, but leave some chunks.

Serve cold, or as cold as your picnic will allow, and enjoy!

3 comments:

Anonymous said...

The recipe sounds good, but if you "went" to a potluck, then you "took" a chicken salad; you didn't "bring" it. Sorry.

Stephanie Zvan said...

[yawn]

Honey, I went to the potluck, taking my salad. I arrived at the potluck, bringing it with me. Writing for most people, one can skip the middle steps without confusion.

Enjoy the recipe.

Anonymous said...

Oh, Anonymous, are you kidding me? And sorry? You aren't sorry, or you wouldn't leave such an obnoxious comment! I've never even read this person's blog and you've annoyed me....
On another note: Thanks for the fun recipe- I will try it tonight- thanks for sharing! :) -Jessica in CT