Hot Chicken Salad

Remember these?? Recipes?? I finally have a new one for you. This is one of the newest recipes I have in my collection, but it was an INSTANT favorite. Hope you love it too!

I first had this dish around Christmas when my friend Marie had some left from a family dinner and brought me a helping because she thought it sounded like something I'd like to eat. Does she know me or WHAT!?!? I immediately asked for the recipe and have made it more than once since!

I'm a big chicken salad fan and love it that this one is extra comforting because it's warm. It also heats up well as a leftover. It's pretty easy to assemble...and you can actually assemble it ahead of time, refrigerate it, and bake it when you're ready, which helps save time!

The Recipe

3 cups chicken, diced
1 can water chestnuts, drained & sliced
1 cup slivered almonds (1 1/2 oz package or smaller)
2 cups celery, chopped
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1 tbsp lemon juice OR vinegar
1 1/2 cup mayonnaise
1 small can fried onions

Mix all together and bake for 30 minutes at 350 in an 11x7 baking dish.

You will be so proud to know that DESPITE the fact I forgot to buy celery the day I made this, I still took pictures to post the recipe. This is Bekah learning to be less OCD! But I must say...the celery really does add to it. I don't want to make that mistake again! Tip about celery: sometimes when I make a dish that calls for it, I end up throwing out most of the celery because I need just a stalk or two and I end up not eating the rest. Last time, I just bought a little cup of pre-cut celery in water. It was clean and I ended up not throwing away a bunch of food. Worth the little extra bit of cost to purchase.


Sometimes when I make dishes like this, I use canned chicken just to speed it up. This time I decided to boil and chop the chicken myself. I started out with 2 packages of chicken tenders. I prefer cooking with them instead of chicken breasts because they're smaller and cook faster.

I put the chicken in a pot of water and bring it to a boil. I let it boil until it is cooked all the way through (which I find out by checking inside to see if it's still pink). The water gets kind of a scaly white thing on top as it cooks.

Very hot chicken! I pull it out of the water and chop it on the cutting board. I kept the extra pieces of chicken to use on top of salads or in other recipes along the way.

I shredded up the chicken once it cooled a bit.

I'm lazy, so I just measure the chicken in a liquid cup (Home Ec teacher would think I'm a failure, but it works for me) so I can see when I get to the 3 cup mark.

After I drain the water chestnuts, I just chop them up. I don't have the finesse of the Food Network people when I do it, but I do get the job accomplished, thankyouverymuch.

I use the Pampered Chef Measure-All cup to measure the mayo. I do not have the patience to dig it out of regular cups.

I literally dump everything into a big bowl. No rhyme or reason.

I try to stir it up really well so you don't get a bite of all one thing.

Spread it out into the baking dish...

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