Strawberry Quinoa Chicken Salad

  It is HOT in Texas y’all and it is only June. It started out innocently enough. We entered summer during a rainy and relatively cool Memorial Day holiday. This lured us into a false sense of security and now we are all burning up.

Texas heat is a different kind of heat anyway. It’s sticky and humid, making the heat feel that much heavier. Let’s not even talk about how I live in the northern area of Texas and it’s less muggy here than in Houston.

When it is this hot and muggy, you know what I don’t like to do? Run my oven. Stand over a hot stove. Boil water. COOK hot food. All I want to do is stand in the kitchen with the refrigerator door open. It’s unfortunate because we have to eat and I can’t go buying our every meal.

So, I made this salad. It requires LITTLE heat to be prepared and can be eaten cold. It’s perfect to take to your July 4th barbecue OR make for your lunches this week. This jewel keeps you in the kitchen only a minimal amount of time with no oven required!

Even better, it’s “healthy.” I put quotations because someone could chime in and say that the feta isn’t “healthy” to which I respond, “it’s dairy of which you need 2-3 servings per day!” Or at least that’s what is recommended and if you’re vegan you could always just leave it out. I think the tang of feta really makes it more delicious. We are talking nutty quinoa and almonds alongside sweet strawberry and savory chicken.

The dressing is SIMPLE. It is an olive oil and vinegar dressing. You probably have the ingredients. You could even have your kiddos help you with that part if you want to get their hands in the kitchen. They could easily stir this salad up and probably help crumble the cheese on top too! Easy peasy!

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Strawberry Quinoa Chicken Salad

(I’m not sure on the servings because I usually just spooned it into a bowl or Tupperware to go)

Salad Ingredients:

• 1 cup cooked quinoa, cooled
• 1 cup sliced strawberries
• 1 cup trimmed fresh spinach
• 1/2 cup fat free feta cheese
• 1/4 cup almond slivers
• 1 1/2 cups cooked chicken, cooled (rotisserie, grilled, boiled…it’s all good)

Dressing Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup olive oil
• 3 tbsp balsamic vinegar
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 tsp pepper
• 1/4 tsp garlic powder
• 1/4 tsp onion powder

1. Layer first four ingredients in a bowl starting with chicken on bottom, then quinoa, spinach, strawberries, almonds, and cheese.
2. Mix all dressing ingredients in a small bowl on the side.
3. Pour over salad and stir to mix. Serve cold.

My salad lasted 4 days in the refrigerator. The dressing is minimal so it won’t get REALLY soggy. Also you can’t really see the chicken in mine but its in there. It’s buried below the spinach!

Adapted from Practical Mommy. Visit her to get the vegetarian version sans chicken and cheese!