Thai Chicken Salad

This Thai Chicken Salad is filled with all kinds of delicious Thai flavors and is topped with an easy peanut sauce. This is a hearty main dish salad full of flavor.

Love Thai flavors? Also check out these Thai Peanut Noodles, this Buddha Bowl with Thai Chicken, or this Spicy Thai Chicken.

One of our favorite dinners are salads. We will often just do a big salad bar so everyone can have what they want, but I do also love to make up big salad and everyone goes to town.

This Thai Chicken Salad is one of our favorites. It’s hearty and filling enough for dinner, yet still helps with that salad craving. And there is so much flavor – your tastebuds will definitely be satisfied!

Ingredients

Yes – the ingredient list on this salad is long, but don’t get overwhelmed. It really doesn’t take that long to throw together. The chopping is the longest part!

The Chicken: I use boneless, skinless chicken breasts, but you could also use thighs. The marinade is simple – comprised of rice vinegar, oil, sugar, garlic, cilantro, and lime juice.

The Dressing: For the dressing you need rice vinegar, Thai sweet chili sauce, sesame oil, and a little bit of sugar. Make sure you add salt to taste, as well

The Salad: This is more of a guideline – feel free to swap in some of your favorite veggies here. I use romaine lettuce, Napa cabbage, red cabbage, cucumber, edamame, carrots, bell pepper, and green onions.

The Peanut Sauce: I have another peanut sauce recipe that I love, but this one is a little different. And it has less ingredients, so it comes together really quickly. You’ll need peanut butter, soy sauce, rice vinegar, Thai sweet chili sauce, an oil. Feel free to use natural peanut butter or commercial peanut butter.

How to Make Thai Chicken Salad

PHOTO 1: Combine the chicken with the marinade in a ziplock bag and refrigerate it for 4-8 hours. I don’t really like to go longer than that because the lime juice will start to break down the chicken and give it a weird texture.

PHOTO 2: Transfer the chicken to a baking dish and bake until cooked through. (You can also grill it – you get great flavor this way!) Once it is cooked, you can dice it or shred it.

PHOTO 3: Make the dressing by simply mixing all of the ingredients together. I like to do this in a jar with a lid, then all you have to do is shake.

PHOTO 4: Make the peanut sauce by whisking everything together.

PHOTO 5: Combine the romaine, both cabbages, cucumber, edamame, carrots, bell pepper, and green onions in a large bowl. Make sure it is really big – this makes a good amount of salad.

PHOTO 6: Pour the dressing over the salad and mix to combine.

PHOTO 7: Add in your chicken. I like to do this after I’ve adding the dressing to make sure the chicken doesn’t soak up the dressing.

PHOTO 8: Dish up the salad, then add on some peanut sauce, peanuts, and cilantro to each bowl.

Tips and Tricks

Save time and use some rotisserie chicken, or pre-made cooked, shredded chicken.

I like to serve the peanut sauce on the side so that people can add it if they want. It’s a must for me, but my husband doesn’t care for peanut sauce so he skips it.

I will sometimes add some sriracha to the peanut sauce or to the top of the salad if I’m feeling like some spice.

All of the components for this salad can be made ahead of time and then assembled when it’s time to eat.

Leftovers can be stored in the refrigerator. It does get soggy, but should be ok to eat for 24 hours after it is made.

More Thai Inspired Recipes

Curried Butternut Squash Soup
Thai Beef Salad
Sweet Thai Chicken Wings
Thai Tacos with Lime Cilantro Slaw
Thai Chicken Wraps with Spicy Peanut Sauce

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