SERIES: classics and spinach salad
Salads can make a great meal. Especially when it starts to get warm out, or if you’ve had a lot of heavy meals or just been eating without a lot of fresh ingredients in your diet. They often hit the spot. I try to target one salad per week in my meal planning. This helps balance things out a bit and brings some variety. But it’s not easy to find great salad recipes that can stand in as a meal. I can assure you this is a great salad recipe. We agree that its our favorite. Something about the combination of grilled vegetables, grilled chicken, and a tangy French vinaigrette. This is one of those recipes where the combination is much greater than the sum of the parts. So do yourself a favor and give it a try – it’s packed full of healthy ingredients.
spinach salad with grilled chicken
Ingredients
Salad
- 1 1/2 LBS grilled chicken thighs
- 6 crimini mushrooms
- 1 red onion, thickly sliced
- 1 red bell pepper, stemmed, seeded, and quartered
- 1 yellow bell pepper, stemmed seeded, and quartered
- 10 ounces of baby spinach
- 4 hard boiled eggs
- 4 slices of bacon
Vinaigrette
- 4 TBSP red wine vinegar
- 2 TBSP Dijon mustard
- 4 TBSP maple syrup
- 1 TSP sea salt
- 1 TSP pepper
- 2 garlic cloves, minced
- 1/2 TSP smoked paprika
- 1 TSP tomato paste
- 2/3 cup olive oil
Instructions
First, season or marinate the chicken thighs and allow to sit as long as desired. I've done a basic salt & pepper seasoning and grilled right away, but you can use whatever preferred seasoning or marinade you like.
Grill the chicken thighs and vegetables (mushrooms, onion, and bell peppers) until cooked through and nicely charred. For this recipe, I prefer grilled chicken to get the charred flavor. The veggies do well on the grill too, but if you're competing for grill space, you can just as easily broil the veggies in the oven until their nicely blackened around the edges.
Prepare the hard boiled eggs and cook the bacon until crispy.
To make the vinaigrette, whisk all the ingredients together except the olive oil and then whisk the olive oil into the remaining ingredients until it's nicely emulsified.
To assemble the salad, place spinach in a large mixing bowl and toss with some of the dressing to coat the greens nicely before topping. Transfer the dressed spinach to a plate and top with chopped (or sliced hard boiled egg), chopped or crumbled bacon bits, sliced veggies, and sliced chicken. You can drizzle additional dressing on top and sprinkle with parmesan cheese.
Notes
Inspired by: Feasting At Home