(yelps) (lettuce thudding) (laughs) - You try catching something flying at you fast from the side. Hey everyone, it's Natasha
from natashaskitchen.com, and I am gonna teach
you how to make a salad, but not just any salad. This is a salad that we created after going to one of our favorite places, The Cheesecake Factory. It is a chicken mango avocado salad, and wait until you taste the dressing. We're gonna start on the chicken. Let's do this. You'll need one pound or
two medium chicken breasts. Cut those in half lengthwise. Now season both sides with
garlic salt and black pepper. (optimistic music) Now place a large skillet
over medium high heat with two teaspoons of olive oil. Once the oil is hot, add the chicken, and cook about three minutes per side or just until it's cooked through. The chicken is done when it
reaches 165 degrees Fahrenheit on an instant-read thermometer, and I'll link to our favorite
thermometer in the notes. Transfer it to a cutting
board and let it cool slightly while you make the rest of your salad. For the base of this salad, we're using one large
head of romaine lettuce. Chop it up into bite-sized
pieces and discard the core. Then rinse and spin dry. You'll end up with about
six cups of chopped lettuce. And if you love salads, a salad spinner is a must-have
tool in your kitchen. It saves so much time. I'll share our favorite
salad spinner in the notes. (upbeat music) Transfer the lettuce
to a large salad bowl, and now we're just going to layer on the rest of the ingredients. The chicken is just about
at room temperature, so slice that into bite-sized strips, and place it over the romaine lettuce. Now my favorite ingredient in this salad is a fresh mango and I
use this mango slicer to make it easy to cut it. If you love mangoes, you
should get one of these. Also, this handy fruit scoop makes it easy to remove the mango from the skin. Quickly dice up the mango and
place it into the salad bowl. Now my next favorite
ingredient, an avocado. And watch how we slice it. This is the safe way to
remove the avocado pit. A ripe avocado is easy to peel and dice, and you don't need any special tools. (upbeat music) Transfer those to the salad bowl, and we'll quickly finish up the rest of the salad ingredients. Thinly slice half of a small purple onion, and this adds great flavor
and color to the salad. Next, slice and add half
of an English cucumber or a large garden cucumber. (optimistic music) We'll also add half a cup
of halved cherry tomatoes. My favorite herb for
this salad is cilantro because it adds amazing, fresh flavor. You'll need about a quarter
cup of chopped, fresh cilantro. Now just layer all of the
ingredients over the salad. And an optional but nice touch at the end is adding some toasted, sliced almonds. The salad is done and we're gonna make a quick homemade dressing to go with it. In a small mason jar combine half a cup of extra virgin olive oil, three tablespoons of apple cider vinegar, two teaspoons of Dijon mustard,
two teaspoons of honey, one minced clove of garlic
or about a teaspoon. Season with a teaspoon of sea salt and a quarter teaspoon of black pepper. Cover that up and shake, shake, shake until it's well-combined. And if you're not serving it right away, give it a good shake just before serving. Whoo! (laughs) That smells so good and fresh. All right, all that's left with this gorgeous, gorgeous
salad is to add the dressing and then just toss it
together, so here we go. And add this to taste. I don't usually use the
full amount which is good because you want leftovers of
this dressing, it's so good. All right now just toss gently to combine, and make sure everything is
coated in that amazing dressing. (upbeat music) All right, that looks so good. (laughing) And onto the best part of the show. I mean, it is for me. I don't know about for you because for you it's
probably pure torture. (laughing manically) Sorry. The taste test, if you
haven't guessed already, that's what we're doing
next, so here we go. All right, in generous amounts 'cause we do everything
in generous portions. (laughs) A little more, little more. Okay, that looks about right. Okay, I'm gonna go in for
the taste test, here we go. Is it just me or is this salad glowing? (laughs) It's the mango and the dressing. Seriously, it's really good. A little bit of everything on my fork because this salad is
just a flavor sensation. (upbeat music) (humming happily) That chicken is so juicy,
perfectly seasoned. And I love the sweet notes from the mango. It makes it feel like a tropical salad. And then of course, the creamy avocado. I like to put avocado everywhere I can. Yum, I can't wait to eat this for lunch. (laughs) I'm excited, are you excited? A dressing is perfect here. It's lightly sweet from the
honey, compliments the mango. Oh, and then I love that
little crunch from the almonds. This is amazing. Now I know you guys love salads because here are some of our
most popular, viral popular, like really, really good right over there and right down there. If you guys enjoyed this
video and love our recipes, make sure you click below to subscribe, and make sure to click
that little bell icon so you'll get notifications
every time we post a new recipe. We'll see you in our next video! (laughing)
