This creamy curry chicken salad comes straight from my mom’s recipe box and it’s been a favorite in our family for years. There’s tender shredded chicken, golden raisins, chopped apple, and crunchy celery, all tossed in a rich and creamy curry dressing.
Classic Chicken Salad Is Taken Up a Notch in This Easy Recipe
Creamy, crunchy, sweet, and savory, this curry chicken salad combines my favorite elements in my classic chicken salad with the dressing from my curried egg salad. It’s from my mom’s recipe box (a friend from book club shared it with her, so I’m not sure where the recipe originally came from), and I love its spunky curried flavor.
The base of the salad is tender shredded chicken tossed with chopped celery, apple, dried cranberries, golden raisins, and slivered almonds for flavor and texture galore. So much crunch!
The creamy mayo-based dressing gets a flavor boost from warm curry powder and a heaping spoonful of apricot preserves, which adds just the right amount of sweetness to balance the savory spices. The result is a chicken salad that feels a little fancy while still being easy enough for a weekday lunch.
Pile it onto croissants, tuck it into lettuce cups, or serve it with crackers as an appetizer. However you dish it up, don’t expect leftovers!
Enjoy!
Ingredient Notes
The full recipe, with amounts, can be found in the recipe card below.
Chicken
You’ll need roughly 2 ½ pounds of cooked and shredded chicken for this creamy chicken salad. You can make your own rotisserie chicken, pick one up from the grocery store, or poach or bake a few chicken breasts.
Creamy Curry Dressing
The dressing is savory, sweet, and slightly spicy from the yellow curry powder, rice vinegar, sugar, and apricot preserves. To make it rich and creamy, I used mayo as the base (I like Hellman’s or Duke’s).
Heidi’s Tip: If using Miracle Whip, which is much sweeter and tangier than mayo, omit the sugar from the dressing. You can always mix in a little sugar if needed, but you can’t take it out!
Mix-Ins
You can make this curried chicken salad with red grapes, but I prefer adding chopped apple for crunch and a mix of plump golden raisins and dried cranberries for texture and sweetness.
For added savory crunch, I also stirred in some finely chopped celery, slivered almonds, and green onion.
How to Make Curry Chicken Salad
- Combine the salad ingredients. Make sure your chicken has cooled completely so it doesn’t alter the texture of the salad fixings.
- Make the dressing. I prefer whisking together the creamy curry dressing in a separate bowl so I can adjust the seasoning to my liking before adding it to the chicken mixture.
- Toss to combine. You can eat the chicken salad right away, but it tastes even better after the flavors have had time to mingle for about an hour in the fridge.
Ways to Serve It
You’ll typically find me sandwiching this salad between two pieces of bread, but there are actually so many delicious ways to serve it:
- Spoon it into radicchio or lettuce cups for a low-carb lunch
- Serve it in puff pastry shells for a simple yet impressive appetizer
- Make sandwiches using toasted wheat bread or croissants
- Wrap it up in a flour tortilla with a few pieces of lettuce and some tomato slices
- Serve it in avocado halves for a filling meal
If you make this recipe, please let me know! Leave a ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️ rating below, leave a comment to tell us what you think, and tag me on Instagram @foodiecrush.
Curry Chicken Salad Recipe
Ingredients
- 2 ½ pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts, cooked and shredded (4 chicken breasts)
- 8 green onions, cut diagonally into thin slices
- 2 ribs celery, cut into thin slices
- 1 red apple, cored and diced (I like Fuji)
- 1 cup dried cranberries
- ½ cup golden raisins
- 1 cup sliced almonds
Dressing
- 2 cups mayonnaise
- ½ cup seasoned rice vinegar
- 2 tablespoons curry powder
- ¼ cup apricot preserves
- 2 tablespoons sugar
- 1 teaspoon kosher salt
- 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
- Add all of the salad ingredients to a bowl. In a large mixing bowl, combine 2 ½ pounds boneless skinless chicken breasts, 8 green onions, 2 ribs celery, 1 red apple, 1 cup dried cranberries, ½ cup golden raisins, and 1 cup sliced almonds.
- Make the dressing. Whisk 2 cups mayonnaise, ½ cup seasoned rice vinegar, 2 tablespoons curry powder, ¼ cup apricot preserves, 2 tablespoons sugar, 1 teaspoon kosher salt, and 1 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper together in a small bowl.
- Combine everything together. Add the dressing to the chicken mixture and toss to coat. Adjust the seasonings to taste. Serve in radicchio or lettuce cups, pastry shells, or as chicken salad sandwiches.
Notes
Nutrition
What to Serve With This Chicken Salad
More Picnic Salads You’ll Love
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