My World

… cold meals are abundant. The deep south gets hot and humid early in the year and it hasn’t disappointed this year.  Having many errands to run today,  I got home in time to start something for dinner.  I laid out a pack of boneless, skinless chicken to thaw before leaving and…. remember I said that is a staple in our house… the thought of cranking up the oven or standing outside to watch the grill to cook it just wasn’t floating my boat. What to do, what to do. One of my favorite goto meals with chicken is salad. Not greens, chicken salad, homemade, with whatever I have stashed in fridge at the time to add in. Simply tossing the chicken in a pan with salt and pepper to boil while I chopped up cold veggies sounded like a plan.

Today’s salad included chopped red onion, yellow squash, cucumber, celery. Chopped small rather than large chunks. This is a fun and easy prep with my favorite Wusthof knife and Boos Brothers Chopping block. Toss all the veggies in a mixing bowl with dried parsley, dried dill weed, black pepper, celery seed, all to taste, a good dollop of mayonnaise to blend all together and a teaspoon of sugar for good measure. Chop the chicken up, always on a separate chopping space than the chopping block as I never chop meat on my veggie/fruit/bread block. Add it to the veggie mix and stir till well blended. Place lettuce on the plate before serving with sliced local tomatoes, cantaloupe and crunchy healthy crackers. That’s a wrap!