Showing posts sorted by date for query coleslaw. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by date for query coleslaw. Sort by relevance Show all posts
With Valentines Day coming up this week, and my stove being out of commission, I thought it would be fun to do something different and create a delicious picnic for my sweetie pie and I to share for the occasion. Its really fun to do and really doesn't take a lot of work.
The weather has been right miserable lately, but that doesn't mean we can't still enjoy a picnic. Some of the nicest picnics can be shared right within the four walls of your comfy home!
The centre piece of my picnic was a delicious Buffalo Chicken Salad that I threw together. You will find the recipe below for a basic chicken salad and 10 variations. This is just one of them, and I can tell you it is really tasty!
I had a good old rummage around the refrigerator this morning while my husband was out and by the time he came home, I had a picnic feast for two more than ready.
We had some leftover potato salad and coleslaw from the other day, so that was packed into a container for sharing . . .
I always have lots of cheeses on hand, chutney's and crackers and so I did up a small cheese tray for us to enjoy. I used some vintage white cheddar, Danish blue, wensleydale with cranberries and boursin cheeses.
I put the chutney into a small Bonne Maman Jar and an assortment of crackers and some butter for spreading in a sandwich container. Be sure to include a knife for cutting up the cheeses and a spoon for the chutney.
You will want a toasted baguette or crisp breads to have with the chicken salad, or even some salad greens. My husband isn't one much for salad greens, so I had soft baguettes for him. No toasting today as there is no oven.
There was a Melton Mowbray Pork Pie in the refrigerator (his favourite pie) and some cheese and onion rolls, so I added a container with them, as well as some English Mustard for him to enjoy with a slice of pie. I also had some black and green grapes, so I washed some of them and put them into another container.
Something sweet is always welcome, so I added a container of his favourite biscuits/cookies and some fruit yogurts.
I also added the required cutlery, dinner plates and glasses, along with some tea light candles (for romance), a blanket to sit on, a book of poetry to share with each other and a fun game to play.
A bottle of sparkling apple juice was the finishing touch. I then packed it into our picnic basket . . . its a red metal one with chrome handles that I bought several years back.
I think its really pretty, although in all truth a wicker one is better as this one is quite heavy once you get it packed. It didn't all quite fit inside, but no matter we weren't going very far . . .
And with there being two of us, we carried the juice separately along with the bread, games and poetry.
As I said, we did not have far to go!
My husband was pleasantly surprised when he got home. I put some nice music on for us to listen to and in all truth, we sat at the table . . . these old bones of ours are not fond of floor sitting, not anymore . . .
It was a really nice spread . . .
I had my chicken salad on salad greens . . . my husband, of course, did not. Oh well . . .
The star of course was the chicken salad. I did the Buffalo Chicken version and it was absolutely fabulous.
The recipe comes from a magazine on chicken that I bought at the grocery store the last time I was visiting Canada. Its a lovely basic recipe . . . .
And then of course there are ten different variations . . . sure to suit every taste!
This really was a lot of fun! And it didn't really take a lot of effort on my part.
It made a change from the usual Winter bill of fare . . .
And injected a bit of sunshine and romance into what was simply a cold, blustery, rainy day!
Yield: 4
Chicken Salad with variations
With a few flavourful additions and basic ingredients you need never have boring Chicken Salad again.
ingredients:
For the basic salad: (see variations below)
- 1/2 pound cooked chicken, chopped
- 1 stalk of celery, chopped
- 2 thinly sliced spring onions (scallions)
- 1/3 to 1/2 cup good quality mayonnaise
- or salad dressing
- 1 tsp snipped fresh basil
- 1/2 tsp finely grated lemon zest
- 1/4 tsp salt
instructions:
- Combine the chicken, celery, spring onions in a bowl. Mix together the mayonnaise, basil, lemon zest and salt. Fold dressing into the chicken and vegetables gently, to combine well. Cover and chill for 1 to 4 hours. Serve on bread, crackers, or salad greens.
Variations:
- 1. Buffalo Chicken - Omit Basil, stir in 1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese and 1/4 to 1/2 tsp hot pepper sauce.
- 2. Hawaiian - Stir in 1/2 cup chopped pineapple. Just before serving, stir in 1/4 cup chopped toasted macadamia nuts.
- 3. Mediterranean - Omit celery. Stir in 1/2 cup chopped marinated artichoke hearts and 1/4 cup crumbled Feta cheese. Top with shredded basil.
- 4. Grape-Nut - Stir in 3/4 cup chopped seedless grapes. Just before serving, stir in 1/2 cup chopped toasted walnuts.
- 5. Bacon-Egg-Tomato - Stir in two chopped hard boiled eggs. Just before serving, stir in 1/2 cup chopped cherry tomatoes. Top with crumbled cooked crisp bacon.
- 6. Spicy Chili - Omit Basil and lemon zest. Stir in 1 to 2 tsp mild chili powder. Top with toasted pumpkin seeds.
- 7. Cashew Curry - Stir in 1 to 2 tsp curry powder. Just before serving stir in 2 TBS chopped roasted cashew nuts. You can also add 2 TBS mango chutney with the mayonnaise.
- 8. Cucumber/Melon - Just before serving, stir in 1/2 cup chopped cucumber and serve on melon wedges.
- 9. Coriander Lime - Omit basil and lemon zest. Stir in 1 TBS snipped fresh coriander (cilantro) and 1/2 tsp fresh lemon zest. Top with toasted sesame seeds and chopped coriander.
- 10. Apple Pecan - Stir in 3/4 cup chopped fresh eating apple. Just before serving, stir in 1/3 cup chopped toasted pecan nuts.
Even if you don't want to do something like this for Valentines Day, it would be fun to just do it on any day to help chase away the Winter doldrums's and blues.
Happy Sunday and Bon Appetit!
We had company for dinner the other night. I did a Roasted Ham with a honey/mustard glaze, some Potatoes Dauphinoise and a variety of vegetables. I also made this delicious coleslaw. I love coleslaw and in my opinion, you gotta have coleslaw when you have ham!
Coleslaw is one of those salads that comes in very handy during the holiday season when we are doing a lot of entertaining. It is easy to make ahead and goes perfectly on any buffet table!
Perfect for Tree Trimming Parties and Pot Lucks!
My mother always made great coleslaw! I can remember watching her stand at the counter making it. She always shredded her cabbage by hand with a knife, and that is the way I like to do my cabbage also, with a knife. I do grate the other vegetables, with the exception of the onion. That I chop by hand as well.
This version is prettied up a bit for the holidays with the addition of chopped dried cranberries. Dried Cranberries are sweet without being overly so and add an almost jewel-like quality!
The dressing is a simple one with sour cream, mayo and Greek yogurt. I have never used the lower fat version in this, but I can't see why they wouldn't work.
There is also dry mustard powder for a bit of a punch, some lemon juice, white wine vinegar, seasoning and a bit of honey for some sweet. The vegetables used are white cabbage, carrots, celeriac and spring onions.
Its just a really, really nice salad!
Yield: Serves 4 to 5
Christmas Coleslaw
Delicious and colourful. A great addition to the holiday buffet table.
ingredients:
1/4 pound celeriac (celery root) peeled and coarsely grated
1/4 pound carrots, peeled and coarsely grated
1/4 pound white cabbage, finely shredded by hand
3 spring onions, finely chopped
75g dried cranberries, coarsely chopped (1/2 cup
60g toasted chopped walnuts (1/2 cup)
poppy seeds to garnish
For the dressing:
40g sour cream (1/3 cup)
2 heaped TBS mayonnaise
2 heaped TBS plain Greek yogurt
1/2 tsp dried mustard powder
1 TBS white wine vinegar
1 TBS lemon juice
2 tsp liquid honey
salt and black pepper to tasteinstructions:
Prepare all of your vegetables. Put them into a bowl along with
the cranberries and walnuts. Whisk together all of the dressing
ingredients until smooth and well combined. Pour over the vegetables
and toss well together to coat evenly. Cover and chill. Stir in the
toasted nuts and sprinkle with the poppy seeds just prior to serving.
the cranberries and walnuts. Whisk together all of the dressing
ingredients until smooth and well combined. Pour over the vegetables
and toss well together to coat evenly. Cover and chill. Stir in the
toasted nuts and sprinkle with the poppy seeds just prior to serving.
Created using The Recipes Generator
You can store any leftovers in the refrigerator, covered, but I don't recommend keeping it for any longer than a day!
Have you seen these? They are called Fruit Savers and I got them from MyKtchn. They are the most fabulous fruit saver/covers. Easy to use and fabulous for all sorts!
Handy Fruit Savers is a 4 piece set of these flexible rubber lids that serve to help to prevent your favourite foods from spoiling. They are reusable covers and will work with almost any round fruit or vegetable, helping to keep them fresh for use the next day.
You can store sensitive foods safe from oxygen, reducing the risk of discolouration, which in turn helps me to reduce food waste and save me money. I just love them! I don't think I would be without them now. You can find out more about them here.
I had been eyeballing a recipe on Delish for a while now for Crack Chicken Tacos. They looked fabulously tasty, but they also looked a bit faffy, with having to bread pieces of chicken breast etc. The idea of that really kind of put me off. I want my tacos to be quick and easy.
Then I discovered these in the frozen food section at our local grocery shop. Reasonably prices and 100% chicken, and with only green and amber lights, they are fairly healthy. And so I picked up a couple packs to see if I could do something with them.
The original recipe called for breading chicken breast chunks with egg, flour, panko, seasoning, etc. You can certainly do all that faffing about if you want to, but I can tell you right now, it's not necessary. You can have something just as tasty on the table in a fraction of the time and with a great deal less effort.
The sauce is amazingly simple. You just warm together some of your favourite BBQ sauce, brown sugar, lime juice and some garlic powder.
I cut all the quantities of the original recipe in half and found that it was more than plenty!
The original recipe called for simply rolling the finished chicken in the sauce before putting it into the tortillas.
That could be why they needed more sauce. I coated the chicken chunks in it 5 minutes prior to the finished bake time and returned them to the oven to actually cook in the sauce for a few minutes, which really enhanced the flavours of the sauce, so you needed a lot less of it for a larger flavour impact.
The original recipe also called for a simple bed of shredded cabbage to sit the chicken on in the tacos. I felt I could do much better than that.
I added a shredded carrot and some sliced spring onions and a couple TBS of Ranch dressing to make it into a coleslaw.
This worked beautifully as a wonderfully tasty bed for those delicious chunks of chicken.
All that needed to be done after that was to drizzle them lightly with some more ranch dressing and sprinkle some chopped coriander leaf on top!
Oh boy but these were fabby do!
Really FABBY DO!!
The flavours were fantastic!
They were quick and easy to make!
And they provided us with at least one of our five a day! You can't go wrong!
Yield: 4
Easy Crack Chicken Tacos
prep time: 10 minscook time: 15 minstotal time: 25 mins
Probably some of the tastiest tacos you would ever want to eat. Quick, easy and delicious!
ingredients:
350g pack of frozen battered chicken breast chunks (12 1/2 ounces)
4 soft flour tortillas, or tortilla boats
For the sauce:
125g BBQ Sauce (1/2 cup)
50g soft light brown sugar (1/4 cup)
2 TBS lime juice
1/2 tsp garlic powder
For the salad:
1/2 small head of cabbage, finely shredded
1/2 carrot, peeled and shredded
2 spring onions, trimmed and finely shredded
2 TBS ranch dressing
You will also need:
freshly chopped coriander leaf for sprinkling (Cilantro)
ranch dressing to drizzleinstructions:
Preheat your oven to the temperature designated on the package of
chicken. Line a baking tray with foil and pour out the chicken pieces
onto the foil. Bake in the oven according to package directions.
chicken. Line a baking tray with foil and pour out the chicken pieces
onto the foil. Bake in the oven according to package directions.
To make the sauce, gently heat together the BBQ sauce, sugar, lime juice and garlic powder. Keep warm.
To make the salad, mix the vegetables together in a bowl along with the ranch dressing.
About
5 minutes before the chicken is done, remove it from the oven and toss
it with the sauce. Return to the oven for the remaining cook time.
Heat your tortillas according to package directions.
5 minutes before the chicken is done, remove it from the oven and toss
it with the sauce. Return to the oven for the remaining cook time.
Heat your tortillas according to package directions.
serve, divide the coleslaw salad between the warmed tortillas, top each
with 1/4 of the coated chicken pieces. Drizzle the chicken with some
ranch dressing and sprinkle with coriander leaf. Fold over and serve
immediately.
Created using The Recipes Generator
I used this Essential 5-in-1 vegetable shredder to do my carrots for the salad. It is so easy to use and comes with a handy bowl that you can shredd your vegetables into. I just mixed up my coleslaw in that same bowl. Its a really handy kitchen tool. Easy to use, clean, store and maintain. I love it and use it a lot. You can find out more here.
We both really enjoyed these tacos. They fit the bill on all counts and fulfilled my kitchen motto, which is for most of what I cook to be quick, easy and delicious! Love, Love, Love! Happy Weekend!
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