I'm feeling a bit smug, and very pleased with myself tonight. I made a low fat chicken salad...

[michael-in-phoenix]

...for my son's lunch tomorrow using left over chicken from the Mexican Roadside Chicken Marsha posted.

A couple of years ago I found a cookbook in a thrift store by Paul Prudhommmmmme (rotund chef of "K-Paul's" fame) called "A Fork In The Road". He took a bunch of favorite recipes and converted them to low-fat and healthy dishes. I haven't made many of the recipes since his cajun cooking requires a capital investment of many thousands of dollars (kidding) in spices (his recipes often call for 12 to 15 herbs and spices), but one technique caught my eye.

He makes a turkey salad with a low-fat dressing made of non-fat cottage cheese, non-fat cream cheese, evaporated milk and non-fat mayo. It sounds somewhat gross, but by the time he gets through adding his litany of herbs and spices it sounded pretty good.

I took the above mentioned non-fat ingredients and put them in a food processor. I kept adding acids and spices (including curry) until I had killed the weird sweetness of the non-fat mayo and cream cheese, and ended up with a really good curry-mayo type dressing for the chicken. It tasted great.

If I ever get a recipe down pat, I'll pass it along. I just had to share my joy!

Michael

 

[pat-nocal]

Did I hear you say pat? Would love the recipe when you get it down....'pat'.

 

[mboley]

Here's one DH and I like... Rec: Low Fat Chicken Salad

Dh's work had a "Healthy Balance" lunch and this was one of the recipes... I've tweaked it a bit. But we use it often with leftover chicken.

(sized for 1 serving - increase as needed)

4 oz cooked chicken breast
2 T fat free mayo (or new Heart healthy mayo)
2 T plain lowfat / non fat yogurt
2 T scallions, thinly sliced
2 T fresh parsley, chopped
2 T red bell pepper, chopped fine
2 T celery, diced
1/4 t dried basil

I've also added chopped up grapes, almonds, and a couple chopped up hard boiled egg whites to the mix.