Featured comment
This salad is awesome! So light and refreshing – I only made a half batch and it’s still so much! Plenty to have for breakfast tomorrow 😉
That one time I put Sesame Chili Vinaigrette on every food I ate ever? Best thing ever.
But can I tell you what’s actually consuming my mind right now?
It’s that I hate bad lunches. Today I ate this horrible tasting, horribly colored, overpriced boxed lentil soup from a health food store. Don’t feel bad for me – it was an American-brand-name-impulse-buy after a few too many scoops of ice cream.
Hey, did I already mention both of my lunch oranges were also devoid of any juice? Crispy oranges are not something that bring out the best in me.
And then there’s this beautiful, filling salad.
Lunch yesterday is a much happier memory. It involved me losing myself in the sweet and spicy happiness of this asian chicken salad. Words started to fade, vision started to go blurry, and I couldn’t even carry on a conversation. When the fork could no longer pick up the last bits of dressing-soaked carrots and peanuts, I picked them up with my finger. And felt okay about it.
By the way, there’s no better way to let people know you’re out of your mind than being a non-conversational salad remnant picker. Totally normal.
So I had it again for lunch, and I then I had again for dinner, and, um, again for (whispering voice) breakfast.
You heard me – I had a salad for breakfast. It’s probably like I’m sick or something, you know, from the water. Because that’s really not what regular people do.
But I woke up and just NEEDED that sweet and spicy Sesame Chili Vinaigrette in my mouth.
Speaking of need, I didn’t even have coffee this morning. This really is a loser food day.
Let’s make more Sesame Chili Vinaigrette.
I mean, Asian Chicken Salad. I mean, yeah.
Asian Chicken Salad with Sesame Chili Vinaigrette
- Total Time: 35 minutes
- Yield: 4-6 1x
Description
This Asian chicken salad has chicken, lots of veggies, and is topped with a seriously addicting homemade sesame chili vinaigrette.
Ingredients
- 1 rotisserie chicken, meat pulled off and shredded
- 2 small heads Chinese green cabbage, shredded
- 2 cups frozen peas
- 2 large carrots, shredded
- 2 cucumbers, diced
- 1/2 cup chopped green onion
- 1/2 cup sweet chili garlic sauce
- 6 tablespoons honey
- 5 tablespoons sesame oil
- 3 tablespoons vinegar
- 4 tablespoons lime juice (I used calamansi – yum)
- 2 teaspoons wasabi paste
- crushed peanuts for topping
Instructions
- Cook the peas according to directions. Drain and let cool slightly.
- Combine chicken, cabbage, peas, carrots, cucumbers, and green onions. Toss to combine. Cover and chill for an hour.
- Whisk the chili sauce, honey, oil, vinegar, lime juice, and wasabi paste until well mixed. Chill for an hour.
- Pour dressing over salad and toss well. Sprinkle each serving with crushed peanuts.
Notes
I like to chill this salad so it’s nice and cold, but you wouldn’t have to chill it for an hour if you were really hungry. 🙂
Also, the dressing is totally personal preference as far as measurements go. Omit the wasabi if you don’t like it spicy, bump up the vinegar or lime juice if you want it to be more acidic, etc.
- Prep Time: 30 mins
- Cook Time: 5 mins
- Category: Lunch
- Cuisine: Asian
Keywords: asian chicken salad, chicken salad recipe, sesame chili vinaigrette
Hey. Have a happy lunch.
Looks so good, Lindsay (and healthy too)! Interesting that you had salad for breakfast. 🙂 I could definitely see making a big batch of it though and eating it for several meals.
This salad looks so good!
Looks so yummy! Can’t wait to make this next week – I even found Sweet Chili Garlic Sauce in Ireland!
Holy Yum!!! This looks amazing. I will most definately be adding this to our meal plan next week. On a side note….either that carrot is HUGE, or the limes are super cute and tiny.
Both!! The limes are calamansis, which are teeny tiny. But the carrot is huge too. 🙂 Welcome to the Philippines!
I love these flavors! This sounds killer! 🙂
That salad looks beautiful! And I love that flavor combination… yummm.
(Just saw your post on FB about the earthquake– and my friends in Japan are all posting about little earthquakes there, too– hope all is well!)
Hey…eating with your hands isn’t COMPLETELY a faux pas in the Philippines…so you’re fine!
This recipe looks like it makes a lot, but I’ll have to grab some cabbage before I head home. Yum!
Hey, there’s nothing wrong with a salad for breakfast! In fact, all the restaurants in Brooklyn seem to serve side salads with their entire brunch menu. This salad sounds pretty perfect to me–fresh and crisp and spicy!
I’m at work, drooling over this amazing salad. And now I have to eat a depressing lunch!
I totally need to make this and bring it to work 🙂
Seriously, my condolences for your lunch. I know how you feel!! But it’s a long weekend and I’m sure you have something yummy planned?! Like a salad with Sesame Chili Vinaigrette? 🙂
This looks super delicious! What I really can’t get over though, is that giant carrot in the background. Holy cow, man! They know how to grow them in Cebu, don’t they??!
Hahaha – yes – they are giant! It’s one of the few vegetables that I can consistently count on being available, in good quality, at the store. 🙂
Looks fantastic. Now I have to make both this dressing and one that won’t set the kids on fire 🙂
Oh my gosh this sounds sooooo good. My family would love. I love a meal I make and I want to eat for every single meal! Success I say. 🙂 as always beautiful pics – love all the stuff in second photo with writing on the table…cool.
Thanks! I adore this table. I bought it at the market from a man who wasn’t selling it… I just made him an offer and he sold it to me! 🙂 I’m already trying to think of crafty ways to get it back to the states! 🙂
Asian chicken salad is totally the way to go, mostly because the sweet dressing is bomb and everything else is just so good with it. And I’m in love with your addition of wasabi paste (We’re total wasabi nuts in my family). I can’t get over the fact that you ate salad for breakfast though. Seriously?! 😀
Printed this one out as soon as I saw it, Lindsay. It looks amazing!
Wow, you use a lot of wasabi, I don’t think I am that game. The salad looks really good for the first day of spring.
I added a little, tasted, and kept adding until I felt like it was just the right amount of spicy. My husband actually couldn’t even taste the wasabi. It depends on your own tastes but also the spiciness of your wasabi paste. Some pastes are spicier than others depending on the quality. 🙂
I get so sad when I have a bad lunch:( it seriously makes or breaks my day! My husband thinks I’m nuts;)
This sounds fantastic! I just made a spicy salad as well (with Korean chili paste) that I wanted to eat 3 meals a day of! I love wasabi…will definitely try this! 🙂
I love this kind of a salad and that vinaigrette sounds wonderful! I would like to use it as a sauce over shrimp or chicken!
This sounds awesome but I have never used sweet chili garlic sauce–where can I find? Do you have a brand name? I have seen chili paste but not sweet garlic. And I may sub edamame for the peas
This brand calls it just “Sweet Chili Sauce”. I’m pretty sure this brand, or something comparable, is also readily available in the states. And YES for the edamame! That’s actually what I wanted to use but I couldn’t find it here in Cebu. 🙁
I stumbled upon your website and I forgot how but it did involve fries with a garlic cheese sauce…which means that your blog was forever imprinted in my potato-garlic-cheese loving brain. And if that wasn’t enough, I see food + Philippines (bonus points for Cebu, where most of my family lives/is one of my favorite places EVER), so consider me a forever subscriber to your blog.
I just wanted to say that it’s inspiring to see you and your husband doing great work in the Philippines. As a 23 year old Filipina with Cebuana roots living in Southern California and doesn’t know what she wants to do with her life at the moment (teach ESL abroad? go back to school? start a blog? become a professional traveling vagabond?), it’s nice to see a bit of home within my Internet routine via your blog. God bless you both!!! P.S. please try the lechon/crispy roasted whole pig because Cebu lechon is THE best.
That’s awesome Christine! And as for the lechon, I will! For sure! Any suggestions for where to get it?
I don’t know where you guys are at specifically but my mom (who grew up there) says anywhere in Cebu City is good!
Good to know. Thanks Christine! 🙂
This salad is awesome! So light and refreshing – I only made a half batch and it’s still so much! Plenty to have for breakfast tomorrow 😉
This salad looks amaaaazing!!! bad thing i live in Colombia and is very hard to find imported products like sweet chili garlic sauce…i am sad now 🙁
Thank you for your post.