Give Chicken Salad A Kick Of Heat With One Spicy Ingredient

Hearty, rich, and versatile to boot, a heaping bowl of chicken salad is a timeless poultry provision that's kept foodies full since the 1800s. Whether you make one from a whole roasted chicken or keep it simple by putting that leftover rotisserie bird to good use, chicken salad has a familiar and enduring taste that you can conjure at the tip of your tongue just by thinking about it. Delicious and comforting as they may be, enduring dishes can sometimes become monotonous, necessitating recipe remixes to avoid palate fatigue. Enter horseradish — the sharp, spicy, and surprising ingredient that gives a basic chicken salad a flavor facelift.

Horseradish is a condiment with a fibrous yet juicy consistency made from grated horseradish root, vinegar, and salt. Naturally, horseradish root has a bold taste likened to wasabi, but when pulverized and combined with the acidic taste of vinegar, it develops a more mellow flavor that's still punchy and tinted with heat. When you introduce it to a bowl of chicken salad, it imbues the rich, one-dimensional taste of mayonnaise with a spicy depth and gives the umami-tinted taste of chicken a new layer of exciting flavor, all while complementing the garden-fresh vegetables with its earthy yet pungent flair.

Because it has a big flavor, a little bit of horseradish goes a long way in chicken salad. One to two teaspoons should make a noticeable impact on the dish, and you can save any leftovers for a scratch-made cocktail sauce or a hangover-curing bloody Mary.

Horseradish alone is flavorful enough to transform your average chicken salad into one with fortitude and fire. If you're feeling particularly adventurous, however, there are other ingredients that you can add to the salad to amplify and complement the bold bravado of the horseradish.

A spoonful of capers can add a layer of briny goodness to a chicken salad, softening the intensity of horseradish without completely muting it. Green onions can amplify the punch of horseradish while simultaneously providing the creamy dish with a satisfyingly savory allium crunch. Similarly, because horseradish belongs to the mustard family, a touch of dijon can bolster its flavor without the change in texture brought by the green onions. Horseradish's intense flavor might not hold up well to common chicken salad fruits like cranberries or apples. However, a pinch of brown sugar is a chicken salad's secret weapon that can mellow out the zing of horseradish with delicate whispers of toasty sweetness.

The next time you're craving a chicken salad, branch out from the basics. Once you try one that's kissed with horseradish, you'll never look back.