Thursday evening’s dinner (I know, this is a slightly belated write up!) saw me attempt a recipe I’d been drawn to from a stunning photo on Tastespotting, an Indonesian Chicken Salad from Kayotic Kitchen and I would urge you to go and look at Kay’s wonderful photos of this dish rather than just my sorry attempt!
I have to admit, I hadn’t properly read this recipe through before starting (I was far too distracted by the photography) and ended up getting myself into a bit of a fluster as a result. I flattened the chicken which Rob then griddled for me whilst I boiled some Jersey Royals and prepared the rest of the salad ingredients (p.s. I used tinned pineapple!). Because of our bad timing, we ended up having to run the potatoes under cold water to ensure they’d cool down in time to prevent us eating far too late! I also went wrong with the dressing, leaving out both ginger and lime. I added the ginger at the end, but somehow our lime had gone missing so we had to make do with a little lemon juice. I definitely didn’t get something right with the dressing as it was still very thick and sticky, making it really difficult to distribute through the salad which resulted in lumps of dressing in some places, none in others, and lots of mauled salad ingredients!
Taste-wise, I really enjoyed it at first, but then went off it about halfway through my portion – I couldn’t tell you why though. However, the recipe makes enough for four so I felt inclined to take some to work on Friday for lunch and then I really did enjoy it. Perhaps it was the stress of getting things wrong in preparation that took away from the flavour that first evening.
I think we will try this one again, it’s certainly a very different combination of ingredients and flavours to what we’d usually put together and makes for a very summery dish (although with all that peanut butter, I doubt it’s particularly light!).
Grub's Up 