Caramelized Shallot and Bacon Chicken Salad
This chicken salad recipe is a goooooood one, let me just tell you this now. There are so many goodies stuffed into one bite, your taste buds won’t know what to do with themselves. They’ll be left wanting for more, and they won’t give in until you’ve polished off your entire bowl of chicken salad you just made, probably with more people than just yourself in mind. Hopefully you have better self control than I do. I did make this chicken salad last for several meals, like the adult that I am, but it was no easy feat. Meal prepping can be a game changer when the recipes you’re making are so good that you want to consume them all in one sitting. Now that I’m thinking about it, it must be the bacon. Bacon makes everything better.
If you have friends that are house shopping for their very first time, check on them. They are not okay. Or maybe they’re splendid and I’m just projecting. That’s always possible I suppose. Here in Connecticut the market is a rough one, which is extremely odd to me, because do you know anybody in their right mind, anybody at all, who is flocking to the state of Connecticut of all places?! The answer is no. And yet here the houses are flying off the market like hotcakes. So house shopping has been an absolute delight. The housing market is so insane right now that homeowners that have serious issues with their homes (crumbling foundations, leaky roofs, etc.) are selling their crap houses for far more than they’re worth. I’m not mad about it. If I were in their shoes I would be doing the same thing too. I just don’t want one of those houses, so the very few that are on the market that don’t have any problems are selling for $30,000, $50,000, however many thousands of dollars over asking price. I literally can’t even. Mike and I looked at a condo last week that was built ON a superfund site. A freaking SUPERFUND SITE. You aren’t even supposed to look at superfund sites, nevermind LIVE on one. Oh yeah, I almost forgot. That condo complex also has crumbling foundation problems, because that’s a big thing in Connecticut too. Why the heck do I live here again?!
I know you came here for the chicken salad. Sorry you ended up receiving a rant about a completely unrelated topic, as I do. Don’t you just adore that Jump to Recipe button?! <3
Ingredients
Method
- Sauté the bacon until brown and crispy using your preferred method (Sauté mode on your Instant Pot, in a cast iron pan on the stove, etc.). When crisp, use a slotted spoon to remove the bacon and place on a paper towel lined plate. Reserve 2 tbsp of bacon fat.
- Add the sliced shallots to a pan with 2 tbsp of bacon fat and place over medium heat. Stir to coat the shallots with the fat and sauté, stirring occasionally, for 10-15 minutes until browned, crisped around the edges, and starting to caramelize. Remove the shallots from the pan and place them on a paper towel lined plate to cool.
- When the bacon and shallots have cooled completely, add them to a medium bowl. Add all of the remaining ingredients to the bowl and mix to combine completely. Serve over salad greens, in lettuce wraps, on bread or wraps of your choosing, etc. and enjoy! Keep leftovers stored covered in the refrigerator for up to five days.
