One Healthy CHICK

As you can tell by all but one (the tacos) of my food posts, I LOVE SWEETS. Well, for the next ten days, I will not be eating any. For my Leadership class, we're going on this detox diet thing created by Dr. Mark Hyman to promote healthy eating amongst teens. Apparently, we're the first class to do it in the whole country, so I guess that's pretty cool. What's not cool is that I'm not supposed to eat any dairy, gluten, or sugar for ten days. Technically, we aren't required to participate, but I need to start eating healthier anyway, so I thought this would be a great start!

While shopping at Whole Foods for an after-school snack a few weeks ago, my mom and I discovered some pretty yummy food there. The best part was, it was already prepared for us. We literally took out our forks and started eating as soon as we got in the car. We tried one of their pasta salads and chicken salad and they were delicious! Since then, we have been shopping there even more and found other things to try as well, like quinoa salads. I could probably eat this food for the rest of my life. I love it!

My school lunches are usually a sandwich with a bunch of little sides things like chips, fruit, and a cookie. For the detox, I had to come up with new ideas for lunches. I really wanted the chicken salad, but it's a little expensive and goes by so fast, so my mom and I decided to find the recipe and make our own!

Here is how we did it.

Sonoma Chicken Salad

Photo and Recipe via Whole Foods

For the DRESSING, you will need: 
1 cup mayonaise
4 tsp apple cider vinegar
5 tsp honey
2 tsp poppy seeds
salt & pepper to taste

For the SALAD, you will need:
2 lbs boneless chicken breast
3/4 cup pecan pieces, toasted
2 cups red seedless grapes, halved
3 stalks celery, thinly sliced


* We had to half the recipe because we didn't have enough chicken. There will usually be more. *

Start by preheating your oven to 375ºF. Place the chicken breasts in one layer in a baking dish filled with 1/2 cup of water. Cover the dish with foil and bake for twenty-five minutes or once the chicken is completely cooked through. Remove the chicken breasts from the dish and let them cool at room temperature. This should take around ten minutes. Cover the chicken again and refrigerate it to keep it cool. I'm sorry I didn't get pictures of this step. I was at soccer while my parents made the chicken.

While that's cooling, you can make the dressing. Combine mayonaise, vinegar, honey, poppy seeds, salt and pepper. My mom was making this with me and forgot we were halving the recipe. We added double the poppy seeds that should have have been put in. Oops! It's a good thing poppy seeds don't really taste like anything.

Chop up the chicken breasts into bite-sized pieces. Mix the chicken, nuts, grapes and celery in with the dressing. Keep mixing until the dressing completely coats everything. We chose to not add nuts because I tend to eat around them. :)

Make sure you keep it cool because it tastes better that way and enjoy!