Tasty Vietnamese chicken salad with rice, crunchy green vegetables and toasted cashew nuts coated in a soy, lime and sesame oil dressing. Perfect as an easy healthy midweek meal.
Now that summer is practically here all I really want to eat is easy healthy recipes. This Vietnamese chicken salad with rice is just the kind of healthy spicy recipe that I love. It's not too light either. The rice makes it filling enough to be a main meal salad which is also exactly what I look for in a salad! By the way, you might also like my Asian chicken noodle salad - it's got similar flavours.
I've mentioned this before but I hate getting hungry soon after I've finished a meal! I promise you that with this healthy Vietnamese rice salad you'll not only stay full but you'll feel good too!
What ingredients are in this Vietnamese chicken salad?
This salad is packed full of some of my favourite oriental ingredients. There's rice and chicken of course but also deliciously crunchy vegetables including peppers, mange touts, onions and cucumber. These raw vegetables give the salad a delicious texture. As do the lightly toasted cashew nuts.
The dressing brings it all together. It's sweet and citrusy but also hot from the raw chilli peppers. There's sugar, fish sauce and sesame oil as well as the freshly squeezed lime juice. What else? Well, a fresh summer salad needs herbs and this Vietnamese salad is generously packed with fresh coriander (cilantro) and chives.
How to cook the perfect rice for this rice salad
I have to admit that I usually just boil, rinse and drain my rice. I know there may be better ways but on an average day I'm way too lazy! So, don't feel you have to follow this method but it is a great way of making perfect basmati rice.
If you cook your rice this way you'll end up with the perfect texture rice for a salad. The rice is light, fluffy and not wet as it can be when it's boiled.
- Soak the rice for 30 minutes firs.
- Heat a little oil and stir fry the rice for 30 second
- Cover it with boiling water and add enough water to come 1 cm above the rice.
- Boil it for just one minute
- Leave it to absorb the rest of the water.
It does take longer but you do end up with very good rice.
How can you adapt this Vietnamese chicken salad with rice?
I made this rice salad with chicken but it would be great with prawns instead. If you want to make it vegetarian or vegan then you could use tofu instead of chicken. You'd also need to use a vegan fish sauce alternative.
If you want you could just miss out the chicken and serve this as rice salad side dish.
It would also be delicious made with rice noodles instead of chicken. If you don't have chives then just miss them out and add some extra coriander.
I love the crunchy toasted cashew nuts but you could use peanuts instead. I actually love this with dry roasted peanuts.
Recipe for Vietnamese Rice and Chicken Salad
Recipe
Vietnamese Rice and Chicken Salad
Ingredients
For the rice
- 300 g Basmati Rice
- 1 teaspoon sunflower oil
For the dressing
- 2 limes juiced
- 2 tablespoon light soy sauce
- 2 tablespoon sesame oil
- 1 tablespoon fish sauce
- 2 teaspoon caster sugar
- 2 shallots or onions finely diced
- 2 birds eye chillies finely sliced
- 30 g bunch of coriander chopped
- 30 g bunch of chives chopped
For the salad
- 120 g cashew nuts roughly chopped
- 300 g chicken cut into strips
- 2 cloves garlic sliced
- 1 teaspoon sunflower oil
- 150 g mange tout (snow peas) sliced
- ½ cucumber cut into thin strips
- 1 red or orange pepper finely diced
Instructions
- Prepare the rice. Put it in a sieve and rinse under the cold tap. Put it in a bowl and cover with cold water. Leave for 30 minutes.
- Heat a little oil in a saucepan. Stir fry the rice for 30 seconds then pour on enough hot water from the kettle to cover the rice and come 1 cm above it. Stir. Cover with the lid and bring to the boil. Boil for 1 minute then turn the heat off and leave to stand for 13 minutes with the lid still on.
- After 13 minutes remove the lid and fork through the rice to separate the grains.
- Prepare the dressing by mixing together all the dressing ingredients. Use more or fewer chillies depending on how hot you want the salad to be.
- Dry fry the cashew nuts in a wok or frying pan. Keep moving the pan so they don't burn. Take them out when they are looking nicely toasted.
- Add a little oil to the pan and stir fry the chicken along with the garlic.
- Mix all the ingredients together and serve.
Notes
Nutrition
More Delicious chicken salads
I love chicken salads. Why not try one of my other chicken salad recipes?
This harissa chicken salad is a real summer favourite of ours!
Or how about this quinoa pesto chicken salad?
I love salad recipes and even have a whole recipe collection for main course salad recipes. Do check it out if you're looking for inspiration!
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KEEP IN TOUCH
Do let me know if you make this healthy Vietnamese chicken salad with rice. I love to get feedback from readers.
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Rose Martine
This so AMAZING! This is a dish that I would totally make for myself and probably keep for myself. My grandmother used to make something similar when I was a little girl.
Corina Blum
It's so nice to hear that this brings back such great memories for you!
Alisha Ross
I tried this last night and served it to my very picky children and their even pickier cousins. What a HUGE hit! I cannot thank you enough – you’ve added a new staple to their diets …
Corina Blum
I'm absolutely delighted to hear that as I know this is a really tasty recipe but it might be a bit too hot for some children so it's great your kids loved it. Did you put less chilli in?
Eb Gargano | Easy Peasy Foodie
This salad sounds amazing - something a little bit different, which I love! And it's great that it's healthy too 😀 Eb x
Corina Blum
Exactly! It's so good I've made it twice in the last couple of weeks too!
Rebecca - Glutarama
My daughter would happily eat rice all day every day - that said, she's rather taken with rice noodle pots at the moment, in fact a little too much so I'd love to convert her back to rice dishes if at all possible, I think you Vietnamese rice and chicken salad may just do the trick.
Corina Blum
I hope so! Good luck with that as I know how hard kids are to convert!
Lisa
Looks yummy, can’t wait to make it. Had to look up a few of the ingredients (ie mange tout). Wish it was in US measurements - but I’ll figue it out!
Corina Blum
I think mangetout are called snow peas in the US. I'll have to add it to the recipe. I hope you manage to make it despite the metric measurements!
Monika Dabrowski
I love salad meals, I usually make pasta salads but a rice salad that's full of fabulous flavours, such as this one, sounds delicious. Thank you for bringing it to #CookBlogShare
Corina Blum
Thanks for hosting Monika! I do think salads with rice, pasta or another grain are great as mains meals at this time of year.
Hannah
This looks delicious - so fresh, colourful and vibrant!
Louise Carruthers
Love the colours and the flavours of this salad! I've got a nut allergy so would have to take the cashews out... but it sounds amazing even without them. Definitely will be giving this a try over the summer.
Corina Blum
Such a shame you can't eat nuts but I'm sure this would be just as good without them!
Donna
I really need to be more creative with my salads! This looks fab! #CookBlogShare
Corina Blum
I'm so pleased you like it Donna!
Jo Allison / Jo's Kitchen Larder
What a beautifully vibrant salad Corina! I'm a huge fan of hearty salads with a substance and yours ticks all the boxes. Love the dressing too! Cannot wait to try it!
Corina Blum
Thanks Jo! I'm so pleased you like it as I am definitely fan of hearty salads too!
Eb Gargano
Love the flavours in this salad. Definitely bookmarking!
hijackedbytwins
Oooh this looks so good and so healthy! I will have some please 🙂 I'll be pinning this one! x
Honest Mum
That looks so light and delicious. x
thecrowdedtableblog
Looks great! I love all the fresh vegetables you included 🙂
Corina
Thank you! It's a really healthy salad as well as tasty - that's one of the things I love about oriental salads.
Fionnuala
I used to eat rice salad a lot but haven't for ages. This sounds really good.
Popping by from #tastyTuesdays
Corina
I was exactly the same until I made this - I'd forgotten how good a rice salad can be!
Dragons And Fairy Dust
This looks lovely, it would be perfect as a side dish
Corina
Yes, it's great that it's so versatile.