Name: Curried Chicken Salad with Rotisserie Chicken
Prep time: 25 min
Total time: 25 min
Ingredients: 3/4 cup nonfat greek yogurt; 1/4 cup mayonnaise; 5 teaspoons curry powder ((can use sweet, hot or madras)); 1/4 teaspoon turmeric; 1 tablespoon honey; 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt; dash black pepper; 3 cups rotisserie chicken meat (shredded); 1/2 red bell pepper (diced); 2 stalks celery (diced); 1/4 cup red onion (minced); 4 scallions (thinly sliced); 1/4 cup golden raisins ((can use regular raisins)); 1 apple (peeled, seeded and finely diced); 1/3 cup roasted, salted peanuts; 1/4 cup cilantro (roughly chopped)

For convenience and ease, make your next chicken salad with rotisserie chicken from the market. No need to season or roast it, because the store does it for you. This rotisserie chicken salad recipe is not your average one either. It’s a curry chicken salad with apples, raisins and crunchy peanuts tossed in a creamy curry, turmeric dressing that’s lightened up with greek yogurt.

Chicken salad seems like a very old-school dish to me. I remember my grandmother, Myne, slow roasting chicken breasts for hers. Because of that step, it took a little time, but the convenience of a ready-cooked rotisserie chicken, makes this classic dish an “anytime” food. I like that. This curried chicken salad with rotisserie chicken has its roots in the classic preparation. It’s simple but with a few twists.

Table of Contents

1 Ingredients for curried chicken salad recipe
2 To assemble chicken salad with rotisserie chicken
3 Curry dressing for chicken salad
4 Don’t over dress the chicken salad
5 Get nutty
6 A dirty little secret
7 Keeps in the fridge
8 Curried Chicken Salad with Rotisserie Chicken
9 Pin “Curried Chicken Salad with Rotisserie Chicken” for later!

Ingredients for curried chicken salad recipe

Rotisserie Chicken (about 3 cups from the breasts)
Celery
Red Bell Pepper
Red Onion
Scallions
Golden Raisins
Granny Smith Apple
Roasted Salted Peanuts
Fresh Cilantro

A good chicken salad should have finely diced onions and celery, not big chunks, but a small enough cut that all you notice is a little flavor and crunch. Diced apple and red bell pepper (cut the same size as the celery and onion) and golden raisins add sweet little nuggets that make this curried chicken salad infinitely more interesting.

To assemble chicken salad with rotisserie chicken

Remove the breasts from the cooked chicken.
Discard the skin and pull the meat from the bones.
Pull the chicken breast meat apart into shreds with your clean hands and transfer to a bowl.
Chop the celery, onions, bell pepper and scallions into small dice (about the same size for all). Transfer to the bowl with the chicken.
Peel and chop the apple to the same size dice as the vegetables.
Add the golden raisins.
Toss to combine.

To make the curry dressing friendlier for bathing suit season, I swapped out most of the mayonnaise for nonfat greek yogurt. (Hey, I can use all the help I can get.)

Curry dressing for chicken salad

Greek Yogurt
Mayonnaise
Honey
Curry Powder
Turmeric
Salt
Pepper

The dressing is 3 parts yogurt to 1 part mayonnaise and gives the curried rotisserie chicken salad a creamy, luscious binder to the meat and vegetables.

Don’t over dress the chicken salad

The key to the curry dressing is not to over-do it. I usually add about half of the dressing to toss with the chicken salad. If it still needs more, add it a spoonful at a time. You want the salad to be coated, but not goopy or wet.

Get nutty

You might also enjoy a little extra crunch in the form of nuts. I used salted and roasted peanuts, but to be honest, you can use any type of nuts you have on hand. It would be delicious with chopped cashews or almonds.

A dirty little secret

You know those big brazil nuts that make up at least half of those Mixed Nut combos? Nobody eats those nuts, right? (In my house — I usually end up with a full cup leftover at the bottom of the container). Well, if you chop them up and add them to the curried chicken salad — and don’t tell a soul — they’ll think you’ve added macadamia nuts. I’ve had so many people go ga-ga because they thought I’d splurged on macadamias. Nope. {This is “circle of trust” stuff, people.}

Keeps in the fridge

Anyway, this curried chicken salad with rotisserie chicken is ready in about 25 minutes (less if you’re a fast chopper!) and it keeps for several days in the fridge, so brown-bagging at 7:30 a.m. just got a whole lot easier. If you are planning on making this for weekday lunches — I’d advise not adding the nuts until the morning you’re packing the lunch. That way the nuts remain crunchy.

More easy chicken recipes:

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5 from 3 votes