12 High Protein Low Carb Chicken Salads

Eating healthy and low carb chicken salads is a great way to get a high protein low carb meal that'll keep you full all day long.  

Many of these can be lightened up and made macro friendly chicken salads by swapping regular mayo for light mayo or cutting the mayo in half with non-fat Greek yogurt.

There's just something special about a delicious chicken salad, whether it be a traditional chicken salad recipe for lunch or something loaded for a main dish dinner or potluck side.

Basic Chicken Salad

This is our basic go-to chicken salad recipe we make over and over again at our house. It's so simple and versatile!

Our family favorite mayonnaise is this one that's low carb, vegan, paleo, sugar free, dairy free, and gluten free. When we want a lighter mayo we'll buy Hellman's Light. 

• 1 large 12oz can of chicken (drained), rotisserie chicken, or shredded (or cubed) chicken
• 1-2 tablespoon mayo (regular or light) - You can swap out half of the mayo for Greek yogurt to lighten up the recipe
• 1 Tbsp+ chopped pickle or celery (or both!)
• ⅛ teaspoon garlic salt - salt and ground garlic powder is fine too
• ⅛ teaspoon ground black pepper
• herbs or seasoning (optional)- our favorites are dill weed or curry powder

Recipe Steps

1. Add all of the ingredients to a bowl and toss to combine.
2. Serve over lettuce to make a salad, in a wrap or lettuce wrap, or pile it up on your favorite sandwich bread.

When we aren't making a mayo based chicken salad (which is often since I love mayonnaise), I like to chop up any leftover vegetables from the week and mix in chopped leftover roasted or grilled chicken.

High Protein Low Carb Salads with Chicken

We've also rounded up 12 more of our favorite chicken salads from both our website and from other recipe websites.

They should give you a wide variety of lunchtime options if chicken salad is a go-to meal like it is for us.

1

Thai Chopped Salad with Chicken

Our Thai chopped salad is loaded with healthy veggies, shredded chicken, and the best healthy peanut salad dressing you'll ever taste! A terrific meal prep lunch that's 344 calories per serving comes together in just 20 minutes.

Check out this recipe

2

Chicken Salad with Cranberries and Pecans

An easy and healthy chicken salad with cranberries and pecans that's delicious served over lettuce, as a wrap, or as a sandwich. Use freshly shredded chicken or canned, either way it's a WHOLE LOTTA YUM!

Check out this recipe

3

Greek Salad Bowl with Chicken

An authentic, healthy Greek salad with chicken, cucumbers, feta, & tomatoes, that you can make for lunch or dinner in less-than 15-minutes!

Check out this recipe

4

Low Carb Cobb Salad

Making a low carb Cobb salad at home is a great way to get lots of vegetables, protein, and fat all in one hearty salad recipe. I don't know about you but my hands down favorite hearty salad is a good old cobb with chicken, especially when eating out.

Sometimes we get lazy about making our own salad dressings and use this store bought paleo dairy free Ranch dressing.

Check out this recipe

5

seekinggoodeats.com

Hawaiian Chicken Salad

Hawaiian Chicken Salad with pineapple, coconut, grapes, macadamia nuts, and a creamy coconut curry dressing - tasty tropical flavors! You'll love this healthy version of a chicken salad with grapes from my sister's blog, that only has 7.8 net carbs per serving. The key to keeping the carb count down for traditional recipes that have higher carb items is to just use less of them, and then beef up on low carb ingredients.

Check out this recipe

6

cafedelites.com

Chicken Cucumber Avocado Salad

A Greek inspired delicious salad that comes together so fast with pre-cooked chicken. Only 5 net carbs per serving! While the recipe uses a rotisserie chicken, our favorite way to pre-cook chicken is actually in our Instant Pot. But this would also make a wonderful grilled chicken salad too when it's close to summer time. This is another salad where it's simple to adjust the macros by cutting back on veggies to decrease the carbs, increasing the chicken for more protein, or increasing (or decreasing) the avocado and cheese to change the fat content.

Check out this recipe

7

www.cookingclassy.com

BLTA Chicken Salad Lettuce Wraps

BLTA made into a hearty and delicious chicken salad! This is the perfect salad when you're on the go because you can just roll it up and it makes a fantastic chicken salad wrap. It's a fancier version of a chicken blt salad since it dresses it up with avocado and other goodness. BLTA stands for bacon-lettuce-tomato-avocado, just mix in shredded chicken for your protein and you have a delicious healthy lunch to take to work on when you're on the go! Only 3 net carbs per serving. You can swap the bacon with turkey bacon too.

Check out this recipe

8

ketoconnect.net

Low Carb Chicken Salad

Our Low Carb Chicken Salad has big chunks of chicken, crunch from pecans and creaminess from sour cream, all for a hearty bite!

This chicken salad with pecans is a flavorful twist on a classic recipe. The secret ingredient in the dressing is actually sour cream, which is a nice change from the standard mayo.

Only 2 net carbs per serving.

Check out this recipe

9

everylastbite.com

Chinese Chicken Salad (Paleo - Whole30)

This Chinese Chicken Salad is packed with cabbage, chicken, carrots, flaked almonds, oranges and a tasty dressing. Ready in just 15 minutes! This lower carb Chinese chicken salad gets on the table fast if you use pre-cooked chicken! While this does have 1 T of honey in the dressing, chef Carmen says that's an easy ingredient to leave out or to substitute with your favorite low carb sweetener.

Check out this recipe

10

forksnflipflops.com

Chicken Salad with Bacon

This light and refreshing homemade Chicken Salad with Bacon is loaded with fresh ingredients. It is a perfect lunch to serve in a sandwich, greens or all by itself.

We're loving the sweet and salty combo of bacon with fruit. The recipe calls for ½ of an apple, which has 21 net carbs, and means that if you take out the apple to reduce the carbs you'd save 3.5 net carbs per serving.

It would be easy to make substitutions by increasing the celery, pickles, eggs, avocados, or nuts.

Check out this recipe

11

wholekitchensink.com

Taco Chicken Salad: Paleo, Whole30, Keto

This Paleo Whole30 taco chicken salad is a fun and flavorful spin on the more traditional mayo chicken salad.

Making a simple low carb taco salad has been one of our favorite ways to still enjoy taco flavors yet skipping the high carb tortilla. This version is paleo too and instead of adding cheese, it's served with a side of avocado.

Bailey adds a wide variety of interesting flavors to her low carb chicken salad recipe, with only 10 net carbs this is a great salad to meal prep and eat multiple days- it serves 6! If you want to bring the carbs down a little, you can skip the tomatoes.

Check out this recipe

12

mypcoskitchen.com

Low Carb Caesar Salad with Chicken

A delicious gluten free chicken Caesar salad made with low carb gluten free croutons and a homemade salad dressing. Did you know can make your own crunchy low carb croutons with dried bread in less than 20 minutes? 5 net carbs per serving. While you of course can make your own caesar dressing at home, we've been loving this store bought paleo dairy free caesar dressing made with avocado oil.

Check out this recipe

Is Chicken Salad Keto?

If you're following a keto diet, you might be wondering if low carb chicken salads can even be on your program. Most people following a keto diet stick to 20 net carbs or less per day, so as long as you're keeping your salads filled with low carb or no carb options, than yes, chicken salad on keto is definitely an option for you.

Many low carb chicken salad recipe ideas also have healthy fats like olive oil, nuts, healthier mayonnaise brands, or fat from avocado. These all work as ideal healthy fat sources when you're going keto.

Some of the recipes in this post might be considered low carb at first glance, if there are ways to bring down the carbs and make easy swaps to turn them into a keto chicken salad recipe, the notes will be included.

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