Vintage Eats Recipe: 1987 Japanese Chicken Salad

Crunch, crunch. MORE CRUNCH!

Have you got the idea that this salad is noisy?

It’s also popular and unusual. Not many salads can claim all three.

Let’s take this recipe apart so you can understand my fascination with it.

First, Japanese Chicken Salad is found in nearly all of the cookbooks I’ve perused from the 1980s. People loved it and took it everywhere – reunions, parties, gatherings of all kinds. It’s simple, quick and most of the ingredients were already in the pantry.

I saw dishes of Japanese Chicken Salad at church carry-ins, but never tried it, due to too much of that green stuff — cabbage.

I couldn’t believe a dish filled with that much green stuff would taste good. The only green food I chose to eat was green beans.

Little did I know what I was missing by not trying Japanese Chicken Salad – the tang of sesame oil and vinegar, snappy goodness of Ramen noodles (raw, not cooked, no less!). Yum!

Today, dietary gurus list cabbage as a Superfood – it’s full of vitamins, low in calories, high in fiber, and packed with antioxidants. Woohoo!

Second, this salad is unusual because of those raw Ramen noodles. Do you know of any other salad that includes them in their raw state? Most college students rely on hot, cooked Ramen noodles to get through late night hungers.

But to crack them into small pieces and stir them into a salad bowl with other ingredients? Weird!

Then you taste Japanese Chicken Salad and realize weird can be fun.

Another great thing about cabbage is that it is cheap, usually under three dollars for a large head. This recipe calls for half a head. I cut that in half to avoid leftovers. Unused cabbage covered with plastic wrap or in a Ziploc bag will stay good in a refrigerator for up to two weeks. It can be used in stews, soups, meat dishes.

Another thing I like about this salad is its versatility. It called for chicken, which I didn’t have so I substituted ham– delicious.

Also, in a desire to add more iron to my diet, I added one cup of raisins. They added color and more fiber.

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This recipe for Japanese Chicken Salad came from a cookbook of the First Reformed Church (formerly First United Church of Christ) in Bluffton, Indiana. The official date of publication is not listed in the cookbook but a call to the church secretary who checked with the kitchen ladies at the church provided me with an approximate date of 1987.

I told you this salad was popular in the 1980s!

My Notes:

1. Toast almonds by placing them in a skillet and turning the burner to low. Toss or move them around to keep from burning for 3-4 minutes. The smell of warm almonds is wonderful!
2. Substitute one teaspoon of onion powder for green onions if you’re out.
3. Cut pepper to ½ teaspoon as I’m not a fan.
4. Substitute 2 sweetener packets for 1 tablespoon of white sugar.
5. Create your own variation of this salad by adding bacon, oranges, apples, sunflower kernels.

Enjoy!

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1987 Japanese Chicken Salad

2 cups chicken, cooked, diced

2 tablespoons sesame seeds

2 ounces almonds, slivered (toasted)

1 package Ramen noodles, uncooked (chicken flavor)

2 green onions, chopped

½ head cabbage (3 cups)

1 tablespoon sugar

Seasoning packet from Ramen noodles

¼ cup olive oil

1 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon pepper

1 tablespoon sesame oil

3-4 tablespoons white vinegar

Picture

In large bowl toss together meat, sesame seeds, almonds, noodles, onions, and cabbage.

In separate bowl create a dressing by mixing olive oil, salt, pepper, sesame oil, white vinegar.

Add dressing to vegetables.

Chill one hour.

Yield: 3 cups/ 6 servings