I have a really simple chicken salad sandwich recipe that my husband starts drooling over as soon as I mention I'm roasting chicken! So When I was looking for ideas of sandwiches to include in a picnic theme event I was putting together, I thought maybe I should just dress up the chicken salad. I did some digging for some chicken ideas and I kept thinking I wanted to try chicken cashew salad – never had it, wasn't sure if it was any good… and I love cashews. So, that was the plan. Chicken and Cashews, sounds great! However, I am not a recipe follower, so I scrapped all the recipes I found and made up my own – I think it turned out pretty tasty AND my kids ate it, but I'll let you decide.
How to make yummy Chicken and Cashew Salad Sandwiches
Ingredients
- 1.5 cups Roasted chicken chopped (about 1 large or 2 small boneless chicken breasts)
- 1/3 cup cashews chopped – I bought whole un-salted cashews, but you could probably purchase already chopped packages.
- 1/8 cup Water Chestnuts chopped
- 1/2 cup Shiitake Mushrooms chopped
- 2/3 cup chopped broccoli
- 1/4 cup Mayo
- 2 tsp Dill
- 1-2 tsp Celery Salt
- I package Alfalfa Sprouts
- Yummy nutty bread – I used Lucky 7 bread from Izzio
Makes about 4 small sandwiches
Note: I originally made this recipe with Bamboo Shoots as well. You can add those in if you like but I found they didn't add any flavor and didn't really offer any unique texture so they kind of got lots in the mix.
Steps to make this oh so delicious chicken sandwich
- Start with roasted chicken. I just add a little seasoned garlic, water and olive oil to a big cast iron pot, add the chicken and bake at 350 for about an hour (depending on the size of the chicken).
- Dice up the chicken, cashews, chestnuts, broccoli and mushrooms separately. For the broccoli I used a whole, fresh broccoli (tree?. fleurette? is that a word? I don't know what it's called) and cut individual bite sizes. If you don't care how fancy it looks, chop it up, go to town, no biggie!
- Put all the chopped ingredients in a large bowl and add the mayo, stir until ingredients are nicely coated with mayo.
- Add about dill and celery salt, stir again. Set aside.
- Grill the bread – or toast. I have a pan that puts pretty grill marks on everything, which my eyes think makes it taste better.
- Add sprouts to one piece of bread and then top with a few spoonfuls of your chicken salad. Top with the other piece of bread.
- EAT! (or share if you'd like)
Tip: you could use this chicken salad recipe as is, without the sandwich. Or, use it to make a wrap with tortillas or even lettuce. I also found, I really liked the flavor and the texture of the shiitake mushrooms… the texture was nearly the same as the chicken, so if you want to go meatless with this recipe, just eliminate the chicken add more mushrooms!
I love how these chicken salad with cashew sandwiches turned out. I really didn't know what I was getting into, I'm a pretty simple cook. The crunch of the veggies was a nice surprise and the flavors mixed really nicely. I'm a big fan of super pretty bread, but am trying to cut down on bad carbs, so I think the nuts in the bread made it good for me… right? Add in other veggies or take out some of the things I added that you might not like. The best flavors are the basics in the mayo, dill and celery salt. Add a little pepper if you'd like and don't forget to really season your chicken well before you roast it.
I hope you love it!
