Gaining Momentum... The Summer Salad Days

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The beginning of this grand experiment, as I mentioned, was not terribly inspired. I threw together a few salads without thinking too much (or at all) about it. So these first few recipes are more like ingredient lists. I tend to assemble salads as single servings according to the size of my container so providing much in the way of measurements is a bit futile…

Mostly “Canned” Salad with Shredded Chicken 


- Spinach

- Canned black beans

- Canned cannelini beans

- Canned corn kernels

- Cherry tomatoes (quartered)

- Yellow bell pepper (diced)

- Red onion (diced)

- Poached chicken (shredded)

- Good olive oil

- Good balsamic vinegar

- Salt and pepper (to taste)

Basically, start with a bed of spinach. Open the three canned ingredients. Put however much you want of each over the spinach. Add whatever amount of tomatoes, bell pepper and red onion you feel like.

The most complicated part is the chicken. I like to poach chicken myself. It takes about 20 minutes and is way cheaper than buying something pre-cooked from the deli counter. Simply bring a medium size saucepan of water (enough to cover the chicken breast) to a boil. Throw in a raw chicken breast. Reduce to a simmer and let cook, occasionally skimming the foam that will form on the surface of the water, for about 15 minutes.

(Martha Stewart will tell you that you should use an instant-read thermometer and make sure the cooked breast reads 160 fahrenheit, but, as you’ll discover, I take shortcuts and also don’t own every piece of kitchen equipment under the sun, or even some of the basics. Cook it for 15 minutes. You’ll be fine.)

Remove the chicken from the water. Let it cool (unless of course you are entering the witness protection program and would like to eliminate your fingerprints). Then shred the chicken into rough strips by hand and toss some of the chicken in the salad. Save whatever you don’t use for your next salad.

Lightly dress with some good olive oil, balsamic vinegar, and salt and pepper. As a rule, I'd hold off dressing the salad until you're ready to eat. Otherwise you tend to end up with a soggy mess. Buy yourself one of those tiny dressing tupperware containers. You'll thank yourself forever as you munch on delightfully crisp salads. 

Voila. Salad. And you didn’t spend $15 at the deli. 

I promise these will get more interesting.