This easy Buffalo Chicken Salad recipe can be made ahead for lunches throughout the week. Great on lettuce wraps or a sandwich!
Buffalo Chicken Salad
I’ve been getting requests for quick and easy low-carb lunch recipes that can be prepped ahead and don’t require reheating. So, I created this Chicken Salad, which checks all the boxes! Since I had some cooked chicken breast and we all love my Buffalo Chicken Dip, this recipe works as a lunch idea instead. If you like this buffalo recipe, you should also try this Vegetarian Buffalo Chickpea Salad, Buffalo Shrimp Lettuce Wraps , and Buffalo Chicken Lettuce Wraps.
I had some cooked chicken breast and no plans for what to do with it, so I whipped up this buffalo salad using the ingredients I had in my refrigerator.
Ingredients
- Chicken: Starting with cooked chicken makes this recipe very fast to pull together. I used leftover chicken breast, but you could sub chicken thighs, canned chicken, or rotisserie chicken. If you don’t have chicken ready to go, throw it in the slow cooker for hands-off cooking.
- Vegetables: Chop red onion, celery, and baby carrots in a mini food processor.
- Buffalo Sauce: Combine Frank’s hot sauce (or sub with your favorite brand) and mayo. If you like it extra spicy, add more hot sauce.
- Blue Cheese: Top with blue cheese crumbles or light blue cheese dressing, but feel free to skip if you’re not a fan.
How to Serve
Here are some different ways to serve this spicy chicken salad.
- Lettuce Wraps: I love the baby romaine lettuce sold at Costco. They are perfect for lettuce wraps, but you can use romaine hearts or butter lettuce.
- Sandwich: Use your favorite type of bread to make a buffalo chicken sandwich.
- Wrap: Stuff a wheat tortilla with this salad.
- Salad: Serve the buffalo chicken over chopped romaine and drizzle with blue cheese dressing.
Meal Prep
You can double or triple this buffalo chicken salad if you need to serve more people. You just chop the veggies and chicken in a mini food process and then coat with the buffalo sauce. It will hold in the fridge for three to four days.
@skinnytaste Episode 2 High Protein Lunch Series! This Buffalo Chicken Salad is great on Lettuce Wraps, bread or wraps and don’t need to be heated (as many of you requested) #lunch #highproteinlunch #easyrecipes @skinnytaste
More Buffalo Chicken Recipes You’ll Love:
- Air Fryer Buffalo Chicken Nuggets
- Buffalo Chicken Meatballs
- Lighter Buffalo Chicken Dip
- Buffalo Chicken Egg Rolls
- Air Fryer Buffalo Chicken Zucchini Skins
Buffalo Chicken Salad
Ingredients
- 6 1/2 ounces cooked chicken breast or canned, from an 8 oz breast, cubed
- 1/4 cup red onion, plus more for garnish
- 1/2 celery stalk, plus leaves for garnish
- 1 baby carrot
- 1/4 cup mayo
- 1/4 cup Frank’s hot sauce, or more to taste
- 6 baby romaine lettuce leaves, or your favorite lettuce for wraps
- light blue cheese dressing, optional for topping
Instructions
- If you need to cook the chicken in the slow cooker, cover it with water 4 hours on low then shred. Use a rotisserie chicken breast or even canned chicken works here.
- In a mini chopper, chop all the veggies, then add the chicken and pulse a few times.
- Transfer to a bowl and mix with the mayo and hot sauce, adding more to taste.
- To serve, spoon into lettuce wraps and garnish with red onion, celery leaves and more hot sauce.
Last Step:
Please leave a rating and comment letting us know how you liked this recipe! This helps our business to thrive and continue providing free, high-quality recipes for you.Nutrition
Categories:
Seems like a lot of sodium. Where is that coming from?
Too much Buffalo sauce it was like a soup rather than chicken salad
Use Greek yogurt in place of the Mayo, cuts the fat! Yummy easy recipe.
Love that idea!! I don’t like Mayo!
The taste of this dish was on point I really enjoyed it. However, the consistency was more like Buffalo chicken dip. I will make this again but next time will not put the chicken in the food processor with the veggies and rather just hand chop for larger chunks of chicken.
How does this have 24g of fat? The mayo? And just to clarify, it makes two servings, each with 24 g of fat?
A quarter cup of mayo, not light mayo, regular mayo has about 44 to 50 grams of fat in it depending on the brand. This is very realistic.
I liked this in theory, but I think I’d not let the chicken get minced in the food processor next time. It was a bit too mushy and I think I’d prefer it a bit chunkier. Mine looked “wetter” than the recipe picture; I did follow the measurements; so maybe the mayo level is a bit off with regards to how it’s written? Not sure, but I think I’ll start with half the mayo and add until I get a good consistency. The picture looks like tuna salad; kind of drier, mine was definitely wetter!
This is delicious! i doubled the recipe, but substituted greek yogurt for half of the mayo. Yum!
I just had the Buffalo Chicken Salad for lunch. Absolutely delicious! I am amazed how flavorful it is with so few ingredients!!! Just can’t say enough positive about this.
FYI I used 1/2 the amount of Frank’s hot sauce than the recipe called for, as I’m sensitive to spicy food. It was spicy enough for me 🙂
And I get to have it for lunch again tomorrow – YAY.
We used shredded chicken breast and it worked great! Didn’t have to pulse for very long and it turned out so yummy! My boyfriend loved it and didn’t even realize it was skinny taste.
I used a rotisserie chicken from the grocery store which yielded 14 ounces of meat so I doubled the recipe but left the Frank’s Hot Sauce at 1/4 cup as I am not a fan of spicy food. Looking forward to having it for dinner tonight.
I love this so much. Made it last night for first time. Absolutely delish. I doubled the recipe and only added the 1/4 cup mayo (lite) and 1/4 cup hot sauce…I’m a wimp…hot enough…sooooo good. I served with lettuce/tomato in a low carb wrap. Better than any restaurant sandwich I’ve had in a long time!.
Only problem is now I have to wait for lunch again tomorrow to enjoy.
Better than any re
This sounds good but my family and I are not big fans of spicy food (trust me, not even a little.) Is there a substitute for the hot sauce that would work well?
IMO nope!
Enjoyed this! I made it with canned chicken for convenience and just dumped it on a couple of cups of romaine. Drizzled on just a bit of light blue cheese (1 tbsp). The food processor makes it easy!
Another knockout flavorful, fast lunch idea. Loved this. I don’t know why I didn’t think to use my food processor to chop veggies finely for chicken salad. Really saved so much time!
Super refreshing! Loved this for lunch.
Really enjoyed this one! Didn’t have the sauce on hand, so I used a combination of Frank’s Red Hot dried seasononing & other hot sauce – tasted great, and super easy to make.
Is the serving size on this 1/2 cup?
Could you sub green yogurt for the mayo?
if you wish!
I made this recipe last night using Fage Non-Fat Greek Yogurt and it was delicious!
How many points would this be on blue. I have dropped WW because PP were not working for me. Thanks.
I see so many recipes that use rotisserie chicken. I find that it is very greasy (not so skinny) even the breast meat with skin removed is greasy. Same with canned chicken. I don’t count calories or anything but I was wondering if you account for the extra fat in rotisserie chicken vs. boneless, skinless breast for those that do?
I don’t, but I cooked my breast in the slow cooker.