Chinese Chicken Salad

This is Evan's absolute favorite meal of all time. I remember his mom making it when we were dating and when we got married it was the first recipe he asked for me to get from her. It's more of a warm weather dish, and when Spring and Summer roll around, we have this probably every week. It's fantastically easy and super delicious!

The ingredients:
2 packages of cole slaw mix; green onions; 1/2 C. sunflower seeds; 2 packages of Ramen noodles (make sure one of them is the oriental kind); 1/2 lb. of cooked chicken; soy sauce; red wine vinegar; sesame oil; vegetable oil; water. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees.

Oh, and sugar. You will need sugar.


Start by dumping the cole slaw into a very, very, very large bowl. I'm not kidding, it needs to be HUGE. I bought this bowl at IKEA and it is the Chinese Chicken Salad bowl.
Take the two packages of Ramen noodles and crush them to smithereens and put them on a cookie sheet. Then take the 1/2 C. of sunflower seeds and also add them to the cookie sheet.
You will be putting these into the oven for about 5-10 minutes. We're just browning them, so keep an eye on them. Burnt Ramen noodles are way nasty. Not that I have ever burnt them before or anything.
While the noodles and sunflower seeds are roasting, take your green onions
and chop them up! Add them to the cole slaw mix.
(I must tell you that, when I first started making this salad, I refused to add the green onions. I felt like they ruined the dish and I hated hated hated green onions. But, as time has gone by, as my taste buds have changed, and as Evan has cried tears of sorrow each and every time that I neglected to add the green onions, I have learned to enjoy the taste in moderation. So, I only use 2-3 green onions. You can always use more--my mother-in-law uses an entire bunch of them--or you can omit them completely.)

Take the cooked chicken and either shred or cube it. Add it to the cole slaw mix.
Oh, look, perfectly roasted noodles and sunflower seeds! Hooray! Add them to the cole slaw mix.
Now it is time for the dressing. In a microwaveable bowl (or measuring cup, as I apparently used), add 1/2 C. of sugar.
The entire packet from the oriental flavored Ramen noodles.
2 Tbsp. of soy sauce.
1/4 C. of sesame oil.
1/4 C. of vegetable oil.
1/4 C. of water.
1/4 C. of red wine (or white) vinegar.
Stir together and then pop that into the microwave for 1 minute.
After you've nuked it, give it another stir and then pour it over the cole slaw mix. Stir the entire salad, being careful not to spill the contents out of the very full bowl and getting it on your khakis and then saying bad words.
When you are done, chill it in the refrigerator (after you've cleared an entire shelf to make way for your OBSCENELY GIGANTIC bowl) for an hour or so.
I neglected to take a picture of this wonderful salad being presented on a plate because, once it's time to actually eat this dish, there is no picture taking. There is only shoving as much of this deliciousness into your pie whole as fast as you can before the kids and Evan eat it all. Oh, and we do tend to add more soy sauce on top before eating it, but please remember, we do love us some soy sauce. Also, please note how the crunchy noodles and sunflower seeds are such a compliment to the tangy dressing and crisp slaw. Yum...

Enjoy!!