Not Delia’s Chicken Sandwich

This chicken sandwich makes a great snack or even a quick meal in minutes if you’re not ravenously hungry. It’s certainly filling enough to make a decent-sized lunch for most people. You could also make this with already roasted chicken or turkey.

Ingredients (per person):

• 1 wholemeal sub roll (or any roll, or two slices of bread)
• 1 boneless chicken breast
• Salad ingredients such as salad leaves, tomato, spring onion – whatever you fancy, really. You can also use whatever salad dressing you like, perhaps Caesar salad dressing, ranch (buttermilk) dressing or blue cheese dressing.
• Mayonnaise (or butter, if you prefer)
• Seasoned flour (optional)

Method:

Wash and pat dry the boneless chicken breast. If you want to keep things really simple, just shallow fry up the whole breast in hot oil. Once the meat is sealed, turn the heat down to let the inside of the chicken breast cook properly. If the juices run clear and not pink then it’s cooked. (There is a risk of salmonella food poisoning from eating chicken that’s not been properly cooked.)

If you want to go for something a bit tastier then dip the chicken breast into seasoned flour, shake off the excess flour and fry it up in the same way as above.

(Seasoned flour is very easy to make. Just put a handful of flour in a bowl, add salt and pepper, paprika, dried herbs such as thyme or oregano, or anything else you fancy. If you can do this, you’re half-way to being able to make your own version of KFC. I’ll do a recipe for Southern Fried Chicken soon. Despite KFC’s secrecy about their recipe, it’s not difficult to make a tasty home-made version!)

I prefer to cut the chicken breast into pieces and dip it into the seasoned flour before cooking. You get more flavour of the seasoning that way, but it’s up to you.

Once the chicken is cooked, it’s a simple assembly job. Split the roll in half, spread with mayo (much nicer than butter), add the slices of tomato, the salad leaves and the chopped spring onions, and pop the pieces of cooked chicken on top. Add a bit of whatever dressing you fancy – or don’t. And voilà – a quick and easy recipe for a filling snack.

I guess it might seem odd to include a recipe for something as simple as a chicken sandwich. After all, a chicken sandwich could simply be a piece of cooked chicken meat between two slices of bread. But I’m sure you’ll agree that this version looks a lot more appetising than your bog-standard chicken sarnie. Try it and see!