Our Favorite Pasta Chicken Salad Recipe, we can’t stop eating this one. Shell Macaroni with chicken breast, peas and a creamy sweet and tangy dressing.
Last Saturday was our monthly Front Range Food Blogger Meetup over at Barb’s house. Barb generously opens her doors to host our group of local food bloggers. I so look forward to our gatherings. Not only is it the ultimate potluck event, but we also get down to business and spend time with discussions to better our blogs. Last month we had photography demonstrations and last week we focused on SEO optimization. So far there’s been about a dozen of us attend, and I’m personally loving every minute of it.
Barb suggested that we blog about and post recipes for the dishes we bring so she can link to them on our Meetup page. I’m all for that since I spend half the social hour begging for recipes. Here’s my latest contribution to our meeting.
My Favorite Chicken Macaroni Salad. Although I’ve had this recipe for about 30 years, it’s not one I make often because I simply can’t be trusted around it. I’ll stand over the kitchen island and eat half the bowl in minutes. So while the “servings” portion of the recipe indicates eight, if I’m around it’s actually six for me and two for you…two if you’re lucky.
Abbie, Macaroni Salad Afficianado
Well it seems I have a macaroni salad soul mate named Abbie. Here’s how the whole thing came down (so to speak). The meeting was winding down. We had all but packed up our leftovers. We had divvied up and Saran wrapped portions of cookies, pastries and assorted goodies to take home and were in the living room finishing conversations when we heard a big crash.
Kirsten over at My Kitchen in the Rockies promptly went to investigate and found Abbie, Barb’s adorable Cocker Spaniel (who although she doesn’t write a food blog is most certainly an important member of our group) with her head buried in my bowl of macaroni salad which she had wrestled to the floor, stripped off the foil covering and was taking those big gasping doggie bites…you know the ones…where they can hardly breath because they’re trying to inhale as much as possible before being caught.
To protect the innocent Kirsten quickly picked up the evidence but once the story leaked, we all had a good laugh. Of course, Barb was unnecessarily horrified, and commented on my blog: “Abbie and I are both sorry she showed little manners. I guess I need a sign, “As cute as she may look, she is a dog who takes advantage of any situation where food is involved”
Abbie, you’re a girl after my own heart!
How do I feel about the whole thing? High five paw Abbie. A compliment that you loved my macaroni salad, but sorry Sistah…I can’t be trusted around the stuff either…but I bet I could have had that bowl emptied before Kirsten got there. 🙂 I mean c’mon there was still half of it left.
Pasta Chicken Salad Recipe
Ingredients
- 4 cups large shell macaroni — cooked
- 10 ounces chicken breasts I’ve used rotisserie, canned and breasts cooked and cubed – it all works, cooked and cut into bite sized pieces.
- 8 ounces frozen peas
- 1 cup celery finely chopped
- 1/2 cup onion finely chopped
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 1/4 cup cider vinegar
- 3 Tablespoon sugar
- Salt
- Pepper
- Dillweed
Instructions
- Cook pasta according to package instructions. In the meantime chop all vegetables and place in a large bowl. Add peas. Drain pasta and pour hot over the vegetables in the bowl. Add mayonnaise, vinegar, sugar, salt, pepper and dillweed.. Mix well and adjust for flavors.
Nutrition
As with my potato salad, I like to have all the ingredients in a large bowl and then add my hot drained starch on top, letting everything sit for a couple of minutes to steam the vegetables and seasonings before I mix together. After stirring, adjust flavors to suit your palate. I usually start with 1 Tsp dried dill and also tweak salt, sugar and vinegar to get it just right for me. As always this is better if it sits overnight in the fridge.
Pasta Chicken Salad Recipe …It’s What’s for Dinner.
This post makes me smile. I’m sorry I missed the Abbie comedy…and the pasta salad. I kept meaning to grab a spoonful and never did. I hope you make it again.
There are so many things at that meetup that I mean to grab a bite of and don’t get around to it. I’ll make it again as a back by popular demand dish. 🙂