Brown Baggin' It - Take 2 with Chicken Salad

One of my biggest struggles with balancing my new exercise regime and food is lunch. I had been doing so wonderfully at packing my lunch, but I fell off the brown-bag-bandwagon when I started working out in earnest. I keep telling myself I will get back to it. I will find a way to balance everything (including baseball - in case you missed it, the 2008 Indians have begun their campaign to make me happy and win a World Series!). So with the best of intentions, I pulled some frozen cooked chicken out of the freezer to thaw on Sunday in my refrigerator. And there it stayed until bright and early this morning. J called to wake me up this morning... and I desperately wanted to just roll over and go back to sleep. But I knew I needed to get up, prolonging the waking is not good for anyone. But it was especially bad since last night I stayed awake until the wee hours of the morning watching the Indians lose to the Angels (damn West Coast games!).

So groggily I plodded down to my kitchen and let my dogs out to have their morning run. And I stared at a bag of avocados on my counter. They looked pitiful and neglected (not unlike my dogs recently). I gave one avocado a little poke to see how ripe it was... and it was the perfect little poke. The avocado gave just enough that I knew it would be delicious. My fingernail didn't break the skin, a sure sign of over ripeness- bleh! And so that sad little bag of avocados prompted me to wipe the sleep from my eyes and whip up lunch.

The inspiration for this meal came from a restaurant that I recently discovered in downtown Columbus called Tip Top. It is the "sister restaurant" to Betty's - another place I have loved in the Short North for a very long time. How could Tip Top be bad with such great genes? Well my instincts were correct - I love Tip Top. If you are ever downtown and want a low-key atmosphere with amazing food, head over to Third and Gay Streets for some amazing food. First and foremost, you must try the sweet potato fries. Then you can order the Honey Shallot Avocado Chicken Salad Sandwich (and if I butchered the technical name of the sandwich, sorry - just order the one that looks like that description, trust me) on a Pretzel Roll. Oh man... so good. I salivate a little bit just thinking about it. There are countless other delicious offerings on their menu, including the Hell Salad and Meatloaf, but the Chicken Salad Sandwich was my inspiration this morning.

I am submitting this to Sweetnicks (a wonderful and beautiful blog) for the ARF/5-A-Day Roundup next week. Hopefully you will be inspired to get out there and eat some fruits and veggies!

Avocado Chicken Salad

1 ripe avocado, roughly chopped
1/4 cup minced onion or shallot
2 T honey
2 T mayo (I used light)
1 T freshly squeezed lime juice, or more to taste
Salt and Pepper to taste
2 cups cooked and shredded chicken meat

Mash or blend all the ingredients except the chicken meat to create a thick dressing. Pour over the chicken and stir to incorporate. Use this chicken salad to make sandwiches or serve over lettuce.