So I don’t know if you recently heard me swear off almond butter, but I did. I told myself I wouldn’t eat it for a month. Stupid idea huh? That’s why I did it, I knew it would be hard and pretty much impossible for me. And guess what…it was. I gave in after three days.Three. Freaking. Days. I’m an adult and I can’t even control my almond butter addiction. But here’s the thing, ever since Georgia and I gave up fruit for the month, Georgia has been consuming higher amounts of fat, meaning almond butter. And she mixes regular almond butter with honey and cinnamon….do you honestly expect me to say no to that? Honestly? You’re stupid if you said yes. I don’t give a sh*t about will power. I give a sh*t about my happiness. Even if that happiness includes love handles.
Ok, back to the point of life. I really REALLY like chicken salad. At Whole Foods, their chicken salad that costs $11.99/lb (yeah I said that right, 11 dollars and 99 cents PER POUND) and is DRENCHED in mayo. It’s stupid delicious. Maybe it’s so expensive because they used 1lb of mayo per .08lb of chicken. Makes sense, right? They’re smart there at Whole Foods. They know mayo tastes good on anything. ANYTHING. I think it would even make that attic fluffy stuff taste good. Back to the point though. Making paleo mayo is exhausting sometimes. I’d just rather not spend 10-20 minutes making mayo when there is a better fat alternative…AVOCADO. So I made a dressing out of avocado. Then I smeared it on chicken and added a bunch of crap from my fridge. Easy peasy.
Paleo Avocado Cilantro Chicken Salad
Ingredients
- 1lb chicken, cooked and diced
- 2 avocados, pitted
- 1 bundle cilantro, stems removed
- 3–4 long carrots, shredded
- 3–4 stems celery, diced
- 1 cucumber, diced
- 1 handful sliced almonds
- juice of 1 lemon
- juice 1/2 lime
- 1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
- salt and pepper, to taste
Instructions
- So you need to start off cooking your chicken however you’d like. If you want a more “grilly” flavor, grill it. Duh. I just boiled my chicken because I didn’t have a ton of time so boiling the chicken was the quickest option. Have you ever seen boiled chicken? It looks disgusting. Just a warning.
- While your chicken cooks, make your dressing. Pull out your wonderful food processor. Mine has been smoking lately. Making almond butter does a number on the engine…oops.
- Add your avocados, cilantro, lemon, lime, garlic powder, and salt and pepper to the food processor. Mix thoroughly until the avocado becomes a paste. This will take about 1-2 minutes or so.
- Once your avocado creamy sauce/paste is tasting delish, add it to your diced chicken. If you haven’t already shredded your carrots or diced your other veggies, do that. I just the shredding attachment on my food processor to shred my carrots.
- Mix veggies into your chicken salad and add a handful of sliced almonds.
- Top with salt and pepper for a little extra flavor and a little leftover cilantro.
this looks delicious! Love the combo of flavors for the dressing. Thanks!
The only thing better in life than almond butter is cashew butter!!! Nice change up on the chicken salad and I agree with the "more mayo is better" concept. Mayo does go with… Well… Everything!
I love almond and cashew butter too. I recently stopped eating it because I was going through a jar every week to week and half. I miss it too.
I just made the dressing (avocados, cilantro, lemon, lime, garlic powder, and salt and pepper)for dinner and added it to the chicken as well as my salad. It's very good!!! I think I'll be putting it on just about everything!!
I totally agree on the almond butter! So good! Have you tried Pecan Butter?? The whole foods up here in Boulder has it and it tastes like pecan pie. No joke. I don't allow myself to buy it very often because (1) it's expensive and (2) I will finish the whole thing in one sitting haha. I know you could come up with an amazing recipe using it, and if you do I'll be the first to try it!!
I just made my own pecan butter just the other night!! You need to check out health-bent.com!! They just had a recent recipe for that…SO GOOD!!
This came out PERFECT. I took out the almonds (allergic) and cucumbers (gets a little watery for me, but also didn’t have any!), and added a red onion. I’m also 5 1/2 months pregnant so I can’t do any of the Paleo mayo recipes with raw eggs, and I just can’t fathom why it’s SO impossible to find a “clean” mayo in the stores. My husband is obsessed with chicken salad, but because I’m so high maintenance with my diet he’s been deprived :(. No longer, thanks to you, girl!
Yeah may can be pretty sketch and it’s even tougher to make it on your own, especially if raw eggs aren’t on your menu. Congrats though!! So glad you liked it! And thank you for checking out the website! Hoping to make it to your gym sometime to wod with you all and my old wod partner Kevin M. Hope you all are taking good care of him haha!
Ah Chicken and avocado…that was one of my prego favorites so I have actually made something so similar to this its crazy. AND your pictures are great! I need to get on that, my pictures suck as I don’t have a real camera yet, just this crap phone lol. Anyways….great recipe! 🙂
Thanks so much Nicole!
THANK YOU for sharing this recipe! It was pure magic. What a creative take on chicken salad! I will be making this over and over again this spring and summer. I added a little bit of green Tabasco because, well, I add green Tabasco to everything, and it was pretty awesome as well 🙂
I can not say enough about how much I loved this! I had some friends over when I made it, and they shared the sentiment (even the pseudo-vegetarian).
That’s awesome val! glad you liked it!
I made this last night. I loved it. Right before I served it I added diced tomatos. Delish. Right on, Juli.
Glad you liked it!! Good work going back in the recipes!