Canterbury Cottage Chicken Salad

I like chicken salad....in a sandwich, on a cracker, with a sliced tomato or avocado, stuffed in celery...it's all good.

Today I thought I would share my recipe and show how you can make it your own.

I buy chicken breasts when they go on sale and boil them with onions, carrots and celery and can them in pints.  If you can food this is much cheaper than buying the little cans of chicken in the grocery store plus you know what's in it.

My basic recipe:

1 pint jar of chicken, drained and chopped, it's about 1 1/2 -2 cups

1/2 a small onion chopped fine

1/4 cup celery chopped fine

1/4 cup pecans chopped fine

2 or 3 swirls of yellow mustard in the bowl

2 large spoonfuls mayo, start with less you can always add more

pepper and garlic powder to taste

I don't add salt because the chicken was canned with 1 tsp in each jar.

I cut up the chicken, chop the veggies and pecans and mix it all up in a big bowl.  I also like it best chilled.

To change up the recipe and make it your own with things you like, you could add a variety of things that are chopped up like pickles, grapes, dried cranberries or raisins, an apple or pear and I'm sure there are many other fruits or veggies that would be good too.  I can see using walnuts instead of pecans and possibly almonds or pistachios.  I also add some dill weed to mine if I have it since I don't care for pickles in it.

If you don't like real mayo feel free to use salad dressing.  It's also good using plain yogurt.  Sometimes I add some ranch dressing for a little zing.  You could probably use cottage cheese if you like.

(note: I save the drained chicken broth to give to my cats as a treat but you can also save it for soup.)

In the photo above you see my sandwich I had for lunch, that's spinach and not lettuce.  I have Irritable Bowel Syndrome and can't eat iceberg lettuce so I use romaine or spinach which have more nutrients for you anyway.

An economical way to stretch out that chicken and make a nutritious lunch.