Salad Mondays, and the Versatility of Poached Chicken

Since my last post about my reluctance in eating salad (and that was a while ago *coughcoughcough*) I've instituted something called Salad Mondays.

Every Monday, a good friend and I have started coming to our choir rehearsal studio a bit earlier with ingredients for salad - it varies from week to week. We've been known to bring chick peas and tuna, a can of sweet corn, fruit cheese, grapes - whatever we fancy can be put into a salad without endangering the taste and mucking it up. The basic idea is, we throw everything together in a big bowl, mix it all up, and then we have a good, healthy, filling and tasty salad for dinner. Plus, we get to say that we've eaten ONE very healthy meal, with all those fresh veggies and fruits.

This does mean that I do tend to look for salad ideas, because by Monday sometimes my brain goes completely blank, and I default to tuna-chickpea salad. Which is all well and good, but one needs variety after all.

So when I stumbled upon Maki of JustBento's recipe for easy poached chicken yesterday, the 'Ahah! Salad material!' lightbulb went off in my head.

The recipe calls for half a chicken breast, but they were out of them at my grocery store so I used chicken strips instead. They turned out just fine. I didn't have sherry on hand so I used the remains of some hard cider I had in the fridge to add to the poaching liquid. And as usual I forgot something - the ginger in the recipe, which would have added a very nice flavour to the chicken.

But! And this is the point - the chicken turned out amazing, even with the substitutions and my brain fart about the ginger. Tender, flavourful, and not overpoweringly salty, it's perfect for light salads, adding to soups, quick sandwiches, and quick breakfast frittatas.

Defintely a keeper as far as recipes go.

In fact, it inspired me so much, I came up with another quick salad recipe - just in time for next Monday too, even better!




Shuku’s Poached Chicken Salad with Shichimi Togarashi and Capers
Serves: 1 hungry, or 2 less hungry, people

½ poached chicken breast, using Maki's recipe
A good handful salad leaves (a mix of lettuce, rocket, wild greens etc works well)
A handful cherry tomatoes
2-3 spears fresh baby corn, snapped into rough rounds
2 tsp drained capers

Dressing:
2 tsp. gluten-free mayonnaise / soy mayonnaise
A splash mirin
Shichimi togarashi

1. Tear salad leaves into bite-sized pieces and place in a medium-sized bowl. Add cherry tomatoes, capers, and baby corn rounds.

2. Shred chicken breast or cut into bite-sized pieces. Add to salad vegetables.

3. Add the mayonnaise, a dash of mirin and a good dash of shichimi togarashi, and toss everything together.

4. Serve right away.