Chicken Broccoli Salad

This delightful Chicken Broccoli Salad has a tasty peanut butter dressing, and this is a unique salad meal that’s good any time of year. And peanut butter fans will love this salad!

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There’s a lot to love about this Chicken Broccoli Salad that’s made from chunks of shredded chicken, small bites of crunchy broccoli, and finely diced red bell pepper tossed with a flavorful slightly-sweet dressing made of peanut butter, soy sauce, lime, ginger and garlic. I’d love this for lunch or dinner!

As soon as I spotted the original version of the salad in Sunset Magazine, I started thinking about how I could adapt it to be lower in carbs. I switched green peas for diced red bell pepper for fewer carbs, used natural peanut butter, sweetened the dressing with Monkfruit Sweetener (affiliate link), and upped the ginger for a more highly-flavored dressing, and the result was an amazingly good combination that I’m sure I’ll make over and over again.

You’ll probably like this wonderful salad even more when I tell you how easy it is to make, especially if you have some leftover rotisserie chicken to start out with.  The dressing ingredients are mixed in the same bowl you toss the salad in, and if you have cooked chicken you could easily have this on the table in 15 or 20 minutes!

What ingredients do you need for this recipe?

• Grapeseed Oil (affiliate link), or other neutral-flavored oil
• Adams 100% Natural Peanut Butter (affiliate link) or other natural peanut butter without sugar
• soy sauce or Gluten-Free Soy Sauce (affiliate link)
• fresh-squeezed lime juice, I used my fresh-frozen lime juice
• ground or Minced Ginger (affiliate link), from a jar
• crushed or Minced Garlic (affiliate link), from a jar
• Monkfruit Sweetener (affiliate link), or sweetener of your choice
• water
• shredded chicken
• red bell pepper
• broccoli, cut into small bite-sized pieces
• chopped peanuts for garnish (optional)

How can you make this salad lower in carbs?

This tasty salad is pretty low in net carbs, but if you prefer even fewer carbs just use more chicken and less broccoli!

Want more salads using broccoli?

If you’re a broccoli fan you have to try my Sweet and Sour Broccoli Salad and Broccoli Salad with Feta and Almonds. Both of those are favorite salads I make over and over!

How to make Chicken Broccoli Salad

(Scroll down for complete printable recipe including nutritional information.)

1. For some recipes I would always use fresh ginger or garlic, but in a dressing like this I love finely ground or crushed garlic and ginger from a jar. Whisk together the oil, peanut butter, soy sauce, lime juice, ground ginger (affiliate link), crushed garlic, Monkfruit Sweetener (affiliate link) or sweetener of your choice and water in the salad bowl to make the dressing.
2. We cooked two boneless, skinless breasts to get 2 cups shredded chicken, but if you have leftover rotisserie that would work well here.
3. The original recipe didn’t specify this, but I’m glad we tossed the chicken with the dressing to marinate while we chopped the vegetables.
4. When my brother Rand told me about the wonderful vegetable chopper he bought recently in Israel, I bought this Progressive International Vegetable Chopper (affiliate link), and it worked perfectly for the red bell pepper. 
5. We cut up a pound of broccoli into small-bite-sized pieces and then washed and dried them in the salad spinner.
6. Then all you do is mix the broccoli and red bell pepper with the chicken/dressing mixture and serve.
7. I ate the leftovers from the fridge for two days, and was sad when they were gone!

More Peanut Butter Love from Kalyn’s Kitchen:

Peanut Butter Tofu with Sriracha
Pork Roast with Spicy Peanut Sauce
Curried Chicken Skewers with Peanut Sauce
West African Chicken Stew

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Yield: 6 servings

Chicken Broccoli Salad

Prep Time 20 minutes

Cook Time 15 minutes

Total Time 35 minutes

Chicken Broccoli Salad has a delicious peanut butter dressing, and this is a one-dish meal that’s good any time of year.

Ingredients

Dressing Ingredients:

• 3 T grapeseed oil (or other neutral-flavored oil)
• 1/2 cup natural peanut butter without sugar (see notes)
• 3 T soy sauce (see notes)
• 2 T fresh-squeezed lime juice
• 1 T ground or minced ginger root (not dried ginger)
• 1 tsp. crushed or minced garlic
• 2 T Granulated Monkfruit Sweetener, or sweetener of your choice
• 1/3 cup water

Ingredients:

• 2 cups shredded chicken (Poach 2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts or use 2 generous cups of diced leftover rotisserie chicken)
• 1 red bell pepper, cut into small 1/4 inch dice
• 1 lb. broccoli, cut into small bite-sized pieces (about 5-6 cups of broccoli pieces)
• 1/4 cup chopped peanuts for garnish (optional)

Instructions

1. If you need to poach the chicken, trim chicken breasts and cook about 10-15 minutes at a low simmer in water or chicken stock. Let chicken cool.
2. Cut chicken into strips and then use your fingers to pull apart into shredded pieces.
3. In a non-metal bowl big enough to hold all the salad ingredients, whisk together the oil, peanut butter, soy sauce, lime juice, ground ginger (affiliate link), crushed garlic, Monkfruit Sweetener (affiliate link) or sweetener of your choice and water.
4. Taste the dressing and see if you want to adjust the seasonings.
5. Add the shredded chicken pieces, toss with the dressing, and let the chicken marinate while you chop the other ingredients.
6. Cut away the ends and remove the seeds of the red bell pepper, and then chop into small pieces about 1/4 inch square.
7. Cut the broccoli into small bite-sized pieces.  (Wash and dry broccoli in a salad spinner if needed.)
8. Add the diced red bell pepper and broccoli pieces to the salad bowl and toss with the chicken/dressing mixture.
9. You can serve this right away or refrigerate for a few hours.
10. Garnish with chopped peanuts when serving if desired.
11. I thought this was very good even after it had been in the fridge overnight; I only wished I had more left over!

Notes

I use Adams 100% Natural Peanut Butter (affiliate link) for this recipe. Be sure to use Gluten-Free Soy Sauce (affiliate link) if needed.

Peanut Butter and Broccoli do have some carbs, but both are relatively high in fiber for lower net carbs.

This recipe adapted from Broccoli Chicken Salad in Sunset Magazine, submitted by Sunset reader Betsy Dasenko.

Nutrition Information:

Yield:

6

Serving Size:

1
Amount Per Serving: Calories: 350Total Fat: 25gSaturated Fat: 4gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 18gCholesterol: 34mgSodium: 609mgCarbohydrates: 14gFiber: 5gSugar: 5gProtein: 21g

Nutrition information is automatically calculated by the Recipe Plug-In I am using. I am not a nutritionist and cannot guarantee 100% accuracy, since many variables affect those calculations.

Did you make this recipe?

Did you make this recipe? Please leave a star rating (under the PRINT button in the recipe) or share a photo of your results on Instagram! THANKS!

Low-Carb Diet / Low-Glycemic Diet / South Beach Diet Suggestions:
As long as you use natural peanut butter without added sugar and use an approved sweetener to sweeten the dressing, this low-carb Chicken Broccoli Salad would be a great choice for any phase of the original South Beach Diet, and a good choice for other low-carb and low-glycemic diets as well.

Find More Recipes Like This One:
Use the Salad Recipes to find more recipes like this one. Use the Diet Type Index to find more recipes suitable for a specific eating plan. You might also like to Follow Kalyn’s Kitchen on Pinterest to see all the good recipes I’m sharing there.

Historical Notes for this Recipe:
This recipe was first posted in 2013. It was updated with more information in 2021.

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