Cranberry Chicken Salad with Blue Cheese & Chives
Course:
Lunch
Cuisine:
American
Yield:
Serves 8
INGREDIENTS:
- 2.5 pounds Roasted Shredded Chicken
- 1 Cup Maytag Blue Cheese Crumbled (Reserve some for garnish)
- 2 ¼ Cups Best Foods Mayonnaise (to taste depending on how you like it)
- 1 Cup Dried Cranberry’s Plumped (Cook the cranberries in 2 cups of apple juice for 10 min then drain and cool completely discard apple juice or drink it it’s pretty delicious) (Reserve some for garnish)
- ½ Cup Chopped Chives (reserve some for garnish)
- ½ Cup Minced Celery
- 2 Tablespoons Apple Cider Vinegar
- Juice of half a Lemon
- 4 Heads Boston Bibb Lettuce core removed and Leaves Shingled
- Salt & Pepper
- 2 Radishes sliced paper thin and held in water for Garnish
ROASTED CHICKEN:
- 1 (5 to 6 pound) Roasting Chicken
- Kosher salt
- Freshly ground black pepper
- 1 large bunch fresh Thyme
- 1 Lemon, halved
- 2 Stalks Celery large diced
- 1 head Garlic, cut in half crosswise
- 3 Large Carrots cut into thick rounds
- 1 large Yellow Onion, diced
- 5 Tablespoons Extra Virgin Olive Oil
DIRECTIONS:
- Place all ingredients into a bowl except for the bibb lettuce.
- Incorporate all ingredients together thoroughly.
- Arrange your bibb lettuce into shingled portions of leaves a top each other for up to 8 people.
- Scoop a very generous amount of Chicken Salad a top each portion of lettuce.
- Garnish with Blue Cheese, Cranberries, Chives and Radish.
Roasted Chicken:
Yields 2.5 pounds Meat
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees F.
- Rub your olive oil all over the chicken inside, outside and under the skin.
- Then very generously salt and pepper your chicken inside and out.
- Stuff the cavity with Lemon, Thyme, Garlic, Onion, Carrot and Celery.
- Place in a roasting pan with wings tucked behind its back as to not burn.
- Roast the chicken for 1 1/2 hours, or until the juices run clear when you cut between a leg and thigh or until an internal temp of 165 degrees.
- Let rest at room temp for 25 min then place in fridge and allow to cool completely before cutting up.
- Once cool pull all meat from the bones and do a very quick ruff chop of the chicken so you still leave semi big chunks.