Sesame Orange Chicken Salad

A quiet week. Sometimes a week is just a week — no milestones, no visitors, no dramatic weather. Just the steady turn of summer days, each one a little shorter than the last, though you don't notice yet. You will. By September, you'll notice. But in early August the light is still long and the evenings are still warm and the garden is still producing like it has something to prove.

I spent Monday morning writing. The blog post was about brown bread — the steamed kind, made in a coffee can, the way Helen does it and her mother did it and every New England woman with a can of molasses and a sense of tradition has done it for longer than anyone can remember. The recipe is simple: cornmeal, rye flour, whole wheat flour, molasses, buttermilk, baking soda. You mix it, pour it in a greased coffee can, cover it with foil, and steam it in a pot of water for three hours. Three hours. Patience. Always patience.

The bread comes out dense and dark and sweet, and you slice it thick and eat it with baked beans or butter or cream cheese, and it tastes like New England tastes in your memory, which is different from how it actually tastes, because memory adds molasses to everything.

I picked the last of the peas. They're done — the vines are yellowing and the pods are tough and the peas inside are starchy instead of sweet. That's the deal with peas. They come early, they're glorious for three weeks, and then they're done and you pull the vines and plant something else. Green beans, usually. The garden doesn't rest. You shouldn't either, but I'm sixty-three and retired, so I rest when the garden doesn't, and we seem to have an arrangement.

Helen and I had dinner on the porch Wednesday evening. Cold chicken — left over from Sunday's roast — potato salad, sliced tomatoes with salt and a little basil from the pot by the door. We ate without talking much. The light was golden. Frost was under the table, hoping for scraps he knows he won't get but waits for anyway, because hope is a strategy that works about ten percent of the time, which is enough.

Sarah called at eight. Ben learned to say "Grampy," or something close to it — "Gampy," more accurately, which I'll take. He's two and a half. He'll get the r's eventually. Or he won't, and I'll be Gampy forever, and that's fine too. Names are what the people who love you call you. The rest is paperwork.

Quiet week. Good week. They're the same thing, mostly.

That porch dinner Wednesday — the cold chicken, the good light, Helen across the table not needing to fill the silence — was the kind of meal that reminds you food doesn’t have to be complicated to be exactly right. I’d been thinking about it all week, turning the leftovers into something a little brighter, a little more intentional, while keeping that same ease. This sesame orange chicken salad is what came out of that thinking: still cold chicken, still simple, just with a little more going on.

Prep Time: 15 minutes | Cook Time: 0 minutes | Total Time: 15 minutes | Servings: 4

Ingredients

3 cups cooked chicken, shredded or sliced (leftover roast chicken works perfectly)
4 cups romaine or mixed greens, roughly chopped
1 cup shredded red cabbage
1 cup mandarin orange segments (fresh or canned, drained)
1/2 cup shredded carrots
1/4 cup sliced scallions
1/4 cup slivered almonds, toasted
2 tablespoons sesame seeds
For the dressing:
3 tablespoons fresh orange juice
2 tablespoons rice vinegar
2 tablespoons soy sauce
1 tablespoon sesame oil
1 tablespoon honey
1 teaspoon freshly grated ginger
1 small garlic clove, minced
1/4 teaspoon red pepper flakes (optional)

Instructions

Make the dressing. Whisk together orange juice, rice vinegar, soy sauce, sesame oil, honey, ginger, and garlic in a small bowl or jar until well combined. Taste and adjust seasoning. Set aside.
Assemble the salad. In a large wide bowl or on a serving platter, layer the greens, red cabbage, carrots, and scallions.
Add the chicken. Arrange the shredded or sliced chicken over the greens. Tuck in the orange segments throughout.
Dress and finish. Drizzle the dressing over everything. Scatter the toasted almonds and sesame seeds on top. Serve immediately, or refrigerate undressed for up to a few hours and dress just before bringing it to the table — or the porch.

Nutrition (per serving)

Sesame Orange Chicken Salad — The Kind of Supper You Eat Without Rushing