There is not much linking these salads save that they all start with the idea that you might have a piece of cold chicken left over in the refrigerator.
Recipe: Chicken salad with spinach and bacon (on this page) Recipe: Golden jubilee chicken salad (on this page) Recipe: Caesar Cleopatra salad (on this page) Recipe: Chicken, almond and parsley salad (on this page)When I was a wee young thing, the spinach and bacon salad at Joe Allen’s was considered quite the coolest thing — and I still love it, indeed love all those outdated, unfairly derided salads tièdes of yesteryear. These days I tend to use pancetta, which I cut myself into rugged little cubes. Feel free, however, to snip up some bacon and fry it up. I have no compunction whatsoever about using store-bought packages of those tender spinach leaves; for me, this would be a nonstarter if I had to get the grit off real spinach myself.
Put the teaspoon of oil in a heavy-bottomed frying pan over a medium to high heat and when it's warm add the bacon pieces and fry until crispy, letting them ooze their salty juices into the pan; this will be the gloriously oily basis for the dressing later.
Toss the spinach leaves and chicken together in a bowl and when the bacon pieces are cooked, take the pan off the heat and add them, too, transferring them with a slotted spatula, leaving the fat in the pan. Now stir the red wine vinegar into the pan, letting it hiss, bubble up and mix, and pour this on top of your salad. Quickly toss to mix: c'est ca.
Serves 2-3
This started off live as a reworking of “coronation chicken,” that mixture I can’t help liking, against all contemporary culinary strictures, of cold chicken, mayo, mango chutney, curry powder and apricot puree (or that’s how both my grandmothers made it). But still, I wanted to pare it down, make it lighter and fresher, and so this is it. Given the year of its inception, and its derivation, it seemed only historically right to rename it thus; believe me, no political affiliations are thereby intended.
Tumble the mango cubes, and any juice they make, into a bowl and, with your hands, mix in the chopped scallion and chilli and squeeze over the lime juice: use as much or as little as you want; frankly, the amount of juice you can get from a lime varies enormously from one to another.
I tend to leave all these to steep while I get on with the rest of my shredding and chopping, but whatever way you do it, tumble in the chunked chicken and shredded lettuce and most of the cilantro and, using your hands, toss to combine. Add the oils and toss again, then decant onto a large serving plate and sprinkle over the remaining bit of cilantro.
Serves 2-3
This is what I call — after a menu in the food court of a Los Angeles shopping mall — a Caesar salad with chicken in it. Best of all the chicken will have been grilled or broiled before being roughly shredded for the salad, but it’s not obligatory. Since I seem to spend half my life teetering on the edge of a low-carbohydrate diet, I never put croutons in a Caesar salad (no hardship: I don’t like them much anyway), but this is rather wonderful with the avocado. Yes, I know that once you’ve added chicken and avocado and dispensed with the croutons and, as I also seem to have done, the anchovies, this has absolutely no right at all calling itself any sort of Caesar salad, but you don’t get to give a recipe a name like this that often, and I’m not passing it up now.
Of course, if you quite properly want to add anchovy, then just pound one soaked and drained salt-preserved little fish to a mush with the egg yolk when you start making the dressing — which again does not quite follow the normal procedures but does a very good job of its own; the chicken, after all, makes for a heavier salad, which requires, in turn, a more creamily emulsified dressing
Tear the lettuce into large chunks and arrange on a plate. Mix up the dressing by whisking the egg yolk in a bowl and carry on whisking as you add the oil slowly. Whisk again, adding the lemon juice and Worcestershire sauce, and pour over the lettuce, then toss well, preferably with your hands, so that all the leaves are coated.
Sprinkle over 2 tablespoons of the Parmesan and toss again. Cut the chicken into fat strips and add to the salad, along with the sliced avocado half, if you're using it. Toss again, then sprinkle over the final tablespoon of Parmesan.
Serves 2
This came about the way most of my favorite food has come about, by greedy opportunism. I had some cold chicken in the refrigerator, a huge bunch of parsley in a pitcher by the stove and had recently opened a package of slivered almonds and I was just too hungry to think further. The important thing is to leave the parsley whole and unchopped — just tear the leaves off the stalks and heap them on the plate in a rough jumble — and to toast the almonds, which just means tossing them about over medium heat in a dry pan until they take on color, at the last minute. I want the heat from them as well as the crunch.
Using your hands, mix the chicken and parsley together in a large bowl or on a large plate. Dribble over the olive oil and, still using your hands, toss to mix.
Now squeeze over the lemon juice, sprinkle over the salt and tip in most of the toasted almonds and toss again. Sprinkle over the remaining almonds, and your work here on earth is done.
Serves 1-2
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