Today’s chicken salad with avocado sauce recipe is delicious, refreshing, and can be ready in just under 20 minutes.
This salad is filled with a variety of whole ingredients, including lean chicken breasts and healthful fresh veggies, all topped with an easy DIY creamy avocado sauce. Enjoy this restaurant-quality meal right at home.
How Healthy Is This Chicken Salad With Avocado Sauce?
This salad contains lean complete protein from the chicken breast, omega-3 fatty acids from the avocado, and a vast amount of vitamins and minerals from the additional ingredients such as greens, tomatoes, and chickpeas.
Chicken breast is a popular choice when it comes to foods rich in lean protein. Lean protein has less fat than other sources, but can keep you feeling full longer and therefore, help you consume fewer calories between meals too.
Avocado is high in monounsaturated fat, which is a good type of fat that may lower the risk of heart problems. It also contains nearly 20 vitamins and minerals that are important for disease prevention and weight loss.
Chickpeas are also a rich source of protein, which makes them a good meat substitute in vegetarian/vegan diets. Additionally, the significant amount of dietary fiber, manganese, copper, and B vitamins present offers a myriad of health benefits, including aiding digestion, supporting heart health, and boosting immunity.
With all of these nutritious ingredients combined, this chicken salad with avocado sauce is a great option when it comes to healthy eating. Let’s take a closer look at the ingredients.
Ingredients You’ll Need
1. Chicken Breasts
In this recipe we air-fry the chicken to get the perfect texture. However, if you don’t have an air fryer, you can either roast or grill your chicken for extra flavor. To save time, you can always look for in-store rotisserie chicken too, but remember that it will already have oil and seasonings added to it (which will increase the fat and sodium content).
2. Vegetables & Toppings
- Greens: This salad is served on a bed of leafy greens, mainly crunchy romaine lettuce. In addition, we opt for a mixture of cherry tomatoes, red onions, sweet corn, and cilantro. These ingredients add more zing to the salad with fresh tastes and vibrant colors. You are also welcome to add your own selection of veggies based on your favorites… or what you happen to have in your fridge.
- Avocados: Ripe avocados are fundamental to this recipe as they offer a buttery and slightly grassy taste which harmonizes with the other ingredients.
- Chickpeas: Canned chickpeas work just fine for this recipe as their nutty flavor suits a variety of salads. Remember you can save the chickpea water (aquafaba) for other recipes too.
- Feta cheese: The tangy umami flavor of feta cheese adds the final touch to the salad and gives your taste buds an exquisite experience.
3. Seasonings
In this salad recipe, we use a blend of salt, pepper, garlic powder, and paprika for an extra kick that ensures truly flavorful chicken.
4. Dressings
The heart of this salad is unquestionably the creamy avocado dressing. With this homemade version, we carefully chose the ingredients to ensure that it’s delicious, nutritious, and still easy to make.
The list of ingredients is simple, containing only the following: lemon juice, Greek yogurt, garlic, black pepper, dill, water, olive oil, salt, and most importantly, avocado. This mixture gives it a rich avocado taste, accompanied by a hint of savory flavor and added zing from lemon juice.
Avocado is an ideal replacement for mayo in a chicken salad dressing. Its healthy nutrient content makes it worth the swap, especially if you are subject to certain dietary restrictions.
How to Prepare This Salad
Chicken breasts: Make deep vertical incisions along the belly of each breast and marinate them for 5 minutes with a blend of seasonings for extra flavor.
Vegetables: Thoroughly wash and cut the vegetables into your preferred size. When mixing the ingredients, remember to set aside the avocado.
Avocados: To prevent avocados from being exposed to the air and turning brown, you should only slice or dice them right before serving.
Sauce: Simply put all of the sauce ingredients into your blender and blitz. This creates a versatile go-to sauce which is wonderful in so many dishes. Be sure to store it in a container or zip-lock bag to minimize oxidation.
Pro tip: You can add more lemon juice to slow down the discoloration of the sauce.
How to Serve
Loaded with nutrient-dense ingredients, this salad makes a great light lunch if you don’t have time for a large meal, or don’t want to eat something heavy in the middle of the day. It can also be served as a heavenly side dish to have with a barbecue or other rich main dishes.
Additionally, it works great with sandwich bread for breakfast. The sweetish malty flavor of the bread helps tone down any bitter flavor from the raw vegetables and helps enhance the creaminess of the avocado sauce.
How Long Does This Salad Last?
To guarantee the freshness of the ingredients for as long as possible, try packing each of them separately in airtight containers and make sure there is no water left on them. Similarly, the sauce should be kept in a carefully sealed jar. You can store the separate elements for up to a week without affecting their original flavor.
After tossing together all of the ingredients, you can put the salad in the fridge for a few hours. However, it’s best to consume it right away to really savor the harmonious taste of chicken, greens, and avocado sauce, and to maintain the best texture.
Don’t try to freeze your leftover salad. Salad never freezes/thaws well; it ends up a bit mushy and strange in texture.
Bright Salads With Flavorful Chicken Breast
This grilled chicken salad recipe introduces a favorite side dish to serve at picnics, barbecues, potlucks,… With just a few basic pantry ingredients, a creamy salad with fresh summer flavors will be ready in minutes!
Fill your tummy with this Chinese-style chicken salad that’s super lean and flavorful. Apart from the julienned vegetables, it also has crispy strands of fried egg noodles, which turn the salad into a healthy snack.
Chicken Salad with Avocado Sauce Recipe
Today's chicken salad with avocado sauce recipe is a nutritious and refreshing dish that can be ready in just 20 minutes. This salad is filled with whole ingredients, from lean chicken breasts to healthful fresh veggies, and topped with a DIY creamy avocado sauce.
- cook TIME 5 mins
- prep TIME 15 mins
- total TIME 20 mins
- COURSE Side Dish
- CUISINE American
- SERVINGS servings
- CALORIES 248 kcal
INGREDIENTS
- 10 oz skinless boneless chicken breasts
- 4 oz romaine lettuce
- 4 oz cherry tomatoes (halved)
- 2 oz canned chickpeas
- 2 oz corn
- 1 oz red onion (sliced)
- 6 oz avocado (sliced)
- 0.5 oz feta cheese (crumbled)
- 4 tbsp homemade avocado dressing
- 1 tbsp olive oil
- 1 tbsp garlic (minced)
- 1 tsp paprika
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1/4 tsp ground pepper
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 2 tbsp cilantro (chopped)
INSTRUCTIONS
Butterfly the chicken.
Marinate the chicken: In a large bowl, season the chicken with 1 tbsp olive oil, 1 tbsp garlic, 1 tsp paprika, 1/2 tsp garlic powder, 1/4 tsp ground pepper, and 1/4 tsp salt. Mix until chicken is fully coated. Then let it marinate for 5 minutes.
Air-fry chicken: Put the chicken into the air fryer and cook at 375 ℉ for 10 minutes. Remove from the fryer and set aside. While the chicken is cooking, chop up all the vegetables for the salad.
Slice the chicken: Once cooked, remove the chicken from the air fryer and cut into 0.5-inch slices.
Assemble: Layer 4 oz romaine lettuce, 6 oz avocado, 4 oz cherry tomatoes, 2 oz corn, 2 oz canned chickpeas, 1 oz red onion and sliced chicken on a serving plate. Garnish with 2 tbsp chopped cilantro. Drizzle the sauce over the salad.
Top with 0.5 oz crumbled feta cheese. Add any extra 4 tbsp homemade avocado dressing on the side (optional). Serve.
NUTRITION
Tuyet Pham
Head Chef, Culinary Consultant
Luna Regina
Writer, Author
Natalie Butler, RD, LD
Nutrition Reviewer