Central New York Salad

I’m from Auburn, NY in Central New York (State). It’s the Canada of New York, we aren’t “New Yorkers” with Brooklyn accents we sound more like we are from the Mid-West. Manhattan and down state may have beautiful museums and ballets and operas and very expensive restaurants and Chinatown and little Italy, but we have WINGS. Buffalo wings and wing sauce are very important to us. A lot of Central and Western NY puts wing sauce on their pizza and blue cheese dressing too (it’s delicious try it). Luckily my husband (from Kansas City, MO) also has a love affair with Buffalo wings. But seeing as we are trying to be good and get down to our fighting weights having regular wings in kind of bad. I’ve come up with a salad that gets the wing flavor across and is super filling but very healthful. You could also just have the chicken and dip and celery and carrots and not salad, what ever get you through the ballgame.

2 cups salad greens
6-8 grape tomatoes
¼ c. chopped celery and carrot (I used shaved carrots in this picture)
2 tablespoons Blue Cheese Dressing (I substituted Ranch in this because I’m in love withTrader Joe’s stupid (I mean amazing!) low fat Ranch dressing)
Sprinkle of blackening or Cajun seasoning
Salt and pepper
1 chicken breast poached and chopped (or use chopped left over chicken)
3 tablespoons “Red Hot Buffalo Wing Sauce” by Durkee (if you don’t have this substitute some hot sauce but not Tabasco, the thicker more vinegary kind)

For the chicken I used a frozen breast straight from the freezer. I browned it in a skillet with some cooking spray on both sides then added about 1 cup chicken broth or water and bouillon. Let the broth come to a boil and then put a lid on the skillet and poach the chicken until no longer pink about 10 minutes. Chop up the cooked chicken and toss it with the wing sauce. Assemble the rest of the salad; pour over the dressing sprinkle on salt and pepper and Cajun seasoning. Top it all with the chicken.