Chicken Taco Salad help, please

[shoyski]

I was planning to make this from the Sept or
Oct issue tomorrow night. However, it uses salsa and I bought two kinds today, neither a go with this household.

Does anyone have a recipe to share without using salsa? I checked briefly on this website and epicurious and couldn't track one down.

Thanks!

[Natasha]

Hi Shoyski,

Here are a few taco salad recipes from the Net that do not use salsa (though I have not tried any of them). They do seem quite different from your original recipe... The first one is a taco salad with beef while the rest are chicken taco salads.
Alternatively, if you still want to make the original recipe but don't like your salsa, you could consider making some homemade salsa (time and inclination willing, of course!). There are a few tried-and-true recipes on this board that sound delicious: just search for the word "salsa". Another suggestion is "Mary's Salsa", which I believe was in the May 2000 issue. It was the easiest thing to prepare, and while it was nothing fancy or extraordinary, it was really quite good.

Taco Salad
join our Healthy Lifestyle & Cooking Groups
send us a your favorite recipe

Here is a recipe that is perfect for our hot weather. Taco salad is easy to prepare and will keep you out of the heat and into the swim of things. You can substitute the ground beef with ground turkey or chicken. For those that are vegetarians, tofu cut into small chunks will work well too. Hasta luega !
What you need:

1 lb. ground beef
1 medium onion, chopped
1 1/4-oz. pkg. taco seasoning mix *
1/2 cup hot water
1/2 head of lettuce
6 oz corn chips
3/4 cup shredded Cheddar or American cheese
2 medium tomatoes, cut into wedges
1/4 teaspoon Tabasco sauce
* To substitute for taco seasoning mix:
add 1/2 cup chili sauce, 1 teaspoon salt, 1 teaspoon chili powder and 1/4 teaspoon Tabasco sauce when adding water.

What you do:

In large skillet, brown ground beef and onion; drain. Stir in dry taco seasoning mix and water; simmer 10 minutes over low heat.
Line separate salad bowls or plates with lettuce; sprinkle with corn chips. Spoon about 1/2 cup beef mixture in center; sprinkle with cheese. garnish with tomatoes. Serve immediately with combination of chili sauce and Tabasco sauce or with prepared French or Russian dressing.
Comments

Meatless Variation
From: Danielle Koenig
we love this dish, only we have a slight variation:
We use drained red beans and no meat. We mix the salad, crumples of chips, beans, cheese, olives (and peppers if you want em) together with low- or no-fat catalina dressing. It's delicious! My kids love to roll this in a tortilla for a forkless salad!

Chicken Taco Salad Serving Size : 4

Amount Measure Ingredient -- Preparation Method
-------- ------------ --------------------------------
1 Lb Chicken Breast
1/2 Head Iceberg Lettuce -- thinly sliced
1/2 C Colby Cheese -- shredded
1 Roma Tomato -- chopped
1 C Tortilla Chips -- broken
1 Avocado -- diced

Slice the chicken breast into thin, short strips. Spray a frying pan with nonstick cooking spray and heat over medium high heat. Add the chicken strips and season with 1/2 tsp. seasoning salt, 1/2 tsp. garlic powder, and 1/4 tsp. each cumin and coriander and cook until chicken is done. Toss together the lettuce, cheese, tomato, avocado, broken tortilla chips and chicken. Serve with your favorite dressing. I used Best Foods fat free Italian and it was delicious!

Ranch Taco Chicken Salad
Category: Poultry
Recipe By: Unknown
Contributed By: Web Page
Ready In: 15 minutes
Servings: 6

Ingredients:
1 Lb. Boneless skinless chicken breasts, sliced
1 Tbsp Each Oil and chili powder (or Mexican seasoning)
1 (16 Oz.) Pkg. Salad greens
1 (8Oz.) Jar Salsa
1 cup Fat-free ranch dressing
1 cup (4 Oz.) Shredded reduced-fat cheddar cheese
1/2 cup Crushed baked tortilla chips


Directions:
Heat oil and chili powder in large non-stick skillet, add chicken and cook on medium high-heat 8 minutes or until chicken is cooked through. Toss chicken mixture, greens, salsa, dressing and cheese in large bowl.
Top with crushed chips before serving.

Warm Chicken Taco Salad
Recipe By : LARRY LUTTROPP
FVKC70A------------------------
4 Chicken breasts, boneless,
- skinless -- cut thin strips
1/2 c Miracle Whip*, divided
1 c Tomato -- chopped
1 pk Taco seasoning mix
4 c Tortilla chips
4 c Lettuce -- shredded
Cheddar cheese -- shredded
Olives -- sliced
Green onions -- sliced

Cook chicken (about 1 1/4 lb) in 1/4 cup Miracle Whip or * Miracle
Whip Light in large skillet on medium-high heat for 3 minutes. Stir
in 1/4 cup Miracle Whip, tomato and taco mix. Cook 5 minutes or until
chicken is cooked through. Layer tortilla chips, lettuce and chicken
mixture on large platter. Top with Cheddar cheese, olives and green
onions. Source: Kraft mailer, 1995.

[This message has been edited by Natasha (edited 10-10-2000).]

[shoyski]

Thanks, Natasha. We took a little bit of every recipe and incorporated it into the salad (no Miracle Whip, though).

The funny part of the story is this...I kept thinking I needed some sort of dressing and had planned on buying Russian, after looking at your post. Forgot my wallet, couldn't of course, go to the store. So I thought, okay, my husband loves Ranch, we'll use that since we have it. You know what he wanted? Sour cream! And it was great. He should be the cook.

[Natasha]

Shoyski, that is funny! Sometimes the simplest things are the best. Anyway, glad it worked out well for you. Cheers.