Dishing Up: Fennel Apple Chicken Salad

Not your ordinary chicken salad!

Are you on Instagram?

Well if you are, and you follow me, you may remember my first spatchcock. I’ll admit I was a little nervous at first. But guess what? It’s super easy!

Oh, wait – you don’t know what spatchcock is? No, it’s not some sort of strange bird – but it sort of sounds like it doesn’t it? Spatchcocking – or butterflying –  is a cooking technique. And you what? It makes a simple, perfectly roasted chicken.

So you’ve probably cooked one or two roasted chickens in your life – or you probably at least have eaten a roasted chicken. Have you ever noticed the breast meat is usually dry? Well there’s a reason for that. Breast meat cooks faster than leg meat. So if you’ve got a whole bird how can you avoid dry breast and achieve cooked leg meat? That’s where spatchcocking the bird comes into play. When you spatchcock or butterfly, you’re removing the spine of the chicken. This allows you to flatten out the chicken in your pan. Why would we want to do that? The legs are now exposed to higher heat which helps them cook faster. So now the leg and breast meat will be done at the same time! No more dry breast meat!

You didn’t know I was going to solve your dry breast meat problems did you? Oh and don’t be intimidated – I know “removing the spine” may sound complicated. But it’s really not. Just use sturdy kitchen shears and place the bird breast side down. Then cut up each side of the spine and remove it. That’s it. (And PS – you’ll be cutting through the rib bones as go). You can keep the backbone in the freezer to make chicken stock later on.

I know – you could just buy a package of chicken breasts or chicken thighs and not have to worry about any of this. But buying a whole chicken is such a value. You can feed a lot of people at one time or if there’s just a couple of people you’ll have leftovers for later. And that’s the case for me. And quite honestly, I really like having those leftovers around – it makes for easy lunches.  There’s so much you can do with leftover chicken. Throw it with pasta or a grain, make a sandwich or how about chicken salad? Oh wait how about Fennel Apple Chicken Salad? Yes please!

What do you like to do with leftover chicken?