paleo chicken salad {plus “baconaise”}

With summer upon us soon, I’ve been craving some summertime favorites like homemade ice cream, grilled zucchini, cole slaw and of course, chicken salad. Many of these favs have definitely transformed in our home since eating paleo, but it’s so awesome that the new-and-improved versions are still yummy and summer-satisfying!

We recently busted out the butter lettuce (my favorite lettuce… so delicious!) and this tasty recipe for paleo chicken salad!

First things first, we needed to experiment with a little something special called baconaise, which is a paleo version of mayonnaise. In order to make the baconaise, you’ll need to save bacon grease from all that bacon you eat. We keep a little sealed container under the sink to store our bacon grease. Here’s the recipe:

• 1 cup of bacon grease
• 2 egg yolks
• 3 tsp lemon juice (freshly squeezed)
• 1 tblsp dijon or yellow mustard
• salt to taste

Put the yolks, lemon juice and mustard into your food processor and turn it on. While it’s mixing up, slowly (like, very, very slowly) pour the bacon grease into the food processor.

Next, for the chicken salad, gather the following ingredients:

• shredded chicken (we buy a rotisserie chicken from Whole Foods and shred it up)
• 1 avocado
• 3 green onions
• 1/2 cup walnuts, chopped
• 1/2 cups grapes (you can slice them, but we leave them whole)
• 1/2 cups celery, chopped
• 1/4 baconaise
• salt & pepper to taste

After shredding the chicken, throw all of the ingredients into a bowl and drizzle the baconnaise on top, then mix it up with your hands or a spoon.

Place some butter lettuce (or lettuce of your choice) into a bowl and put the chicken salad on top of the lettuce. Serve it up with some plantain chips and boo-yah… a spectacular summertime paleo favorite, chicken salad!

You will know them by their fruits. Do men gather grapes from thornbushes or figs from thistles? Even so, every good tree bears good fruit, but a bad tree bears bad fruit. | Matthew 7:16-17