Tame the High-Strung: Blue Hair Boogie Chicken Salad

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The years I spent as a chef at The Downtown Grill in Oxford taught me many things about cooking and food. It also taught me many things about life and people – specifically, Southern Bridge Ladies.

Bridge Ladies were part of the core group of Grill regulars. Y’all! Some of these women were a stone-cold trip and high maintenance – Lord, have mercy. 

There are two things that will tame a group of high-strung, bless-your-heart Bridge Ladies on any given day: gin and good chicken salad - or as I like to call it - Blue Hair Boogie Salad.

The most cutthroat Southern WASP can be made to purr like a kitten with the correct ratio of these two items. The formula is two parts gin to one part Boogie Salad. If, by chance, it’s cold and rainy, add Captain’s Wafers to ensure a calming, trance-like state.

Making good chicken salad takes some time, guys, so if you are looking for a quick fix then this is not the recipe for you. But if you are ready to dig in and make chicken salad like your mama and them did, with a little extra effort, then I salute you with the recipe of my grandmother and the one we use at the BTC in Water Valley.

Blue Hair Boogie Salad or Dixie’s Chicken Salad

Ingredients:

1 whole chicken (use a good quality hen; I go for a medium-size bird)

Chicken poaching ingredients:
1/2 cup dry white wine
2 bay leaves
1 large sweet yellow onion, quartered
2 carrots, cut in half
2 outside stalks celery, cut in half
2 lemons, cut in half
6 whole peppercorns
1 tablespoon salt

Salad ingredients:
4 boiled eggs, peeled and chopped
1 cup sweet gherkin pickles, rough chopped
1/2 cup celery hearts with leaves, finely diced
2 cups mayonnaise
2 lemons, juiced
1 teaspoon ground white pepper
1 dash Tabasco
Salt to taste 

Directions:

In a large Dutch oven or stock pot, add chicken with poaching ingredients. You want to turn the heat up to medium and let the hen come to a slow and gentle boil. An angry, raging pot spitting chicken broth on your wall and stove does nothing but make the chicken salad dry. You want to cook the chicken until a leg will come off with a gentle pull. At this point take the entire pot off the stove and let it cool down for about 30 -45 minutes. Making the chicken salad while the bird is slightly warm – it’s one of the things that puts the boogie in the salad.

When the chicken is cool enough to handle, you want to carefully remove and put into a separate bowl (use a big bowl so you will have some room to work). I use a strainer with a handle that so I can scoop the bird out of the pot and into the bowl. Hopefully, your bird is falling apart so do not try to lift out with tongs or you will be a helpless burn victim. Also, reserve your stock. It will make excellent chicken and dumplings or soup; just strain well and freeze for a later date.

Pick the hen clean, discard bones and skin.

The next step is a key step and what will give you the texture that you want for an old school Southern blue hair boogie chicken salad. Using either a handheld mixer (which is my choice for this) or a KitchenAid stand up mixer (using the whisk attachment), give it a quick once or twice around the bowl on a low speed. This will shred your chicken for you!

Then add remaining ingredients. Put on some gloves and mix it by hand.

For the mayo, I like to add it a little at a time until it gets to the texture I am looking for. Just know that when you refrigerate the salad, it will absorb some of the mayo, so always make sure you have enough to keep it moist; no one likes dry chicken salad. Sometimes it’s going to take a little less than 2 cups and sometimes a little more. It just depends on which way the wind is blowing.

Also, add enough salt for your particular comfort level, but please - in the name of all good things - add a little because again, who wants bland chicken salad? No one! That’s who.

This chicken salad will hold up to 7 days in the fridge, but really, y’all, if the boogie salad is still in the fridge after 7 days, you should not have wasted your time, and clearly there was no boogie to be had.

Enjoy! And remember, Bridge Ladies like to Boogie just like you.

One final word. I came to be quite fond of the DTG Bridge Ladies as time went on during my tenure as their chef. Many of them have gone on to their next adventure, and I will always chuckle as I remember the stories. I hope that in my bless-your-heart-blue-hair days, I can still be a pistol like these ladies.

Notes

  • Please use only Hellman’s Mayo or Duke’s as anything else would be Yankee blasphemy.

  • My preferred Gherkin pickle is Mt. Olive.

  • Celery hearts are the inside light green center in a bunch of celery.