Grilled Chicken Salad With Basil Vinaigrette

Doesn’t that look good?  Maybe even too healthy?

I will admit that participating in this fitness challenge has made me appreciate how good fresh food tastes.  Now instead of filling my grocery cart full of processed foods, the majority of my shopping occurs on the perimeter of the grocery store, where the good stuff is.  I have a fonder appreciation for what it takes to grow such pretty organic produce.  Sure anyone can grow perfect peppers if they use pesticides and fertilizers.  Try doing it au natural, that’s a bit more challenging.

Don’t get me wrong, there is a time and place for processed food.  Sometimes I just don’t have the time to cook breakfast and throwing a breakfast bread bowl in the microwave is a fast and easy way for me to get a warm breakfast that tastes good.  And everyone knows how much I love McDonald’s.  I can’t give it up for a while but darn those french fries call out my name.   But for now, I’m eating the good stuff and I’m sharing some awesome healthy recipes with you.

I’ve made recipes from Skinny Taste before.  This is another one of Gina’s awesome recipes with a few tweaks by me.  It seems like an ordinary spinach salad with grilled chicken and it is, until you add the basil vinaigrette.  Don’t skimp on that stuff.  Make extra and dip your leftover chicken in it the next day.  I did.

Grilled Chicken Salad w/ Basil Vinaigrette

Ingredients:

• Baby spinach
• Shredded carrots
• Shallots
• Red bell pepper, cut into thin strips
• Cherry or grape tomatoes, halved
• 4 chicken breasts (I cut two “normal” size breasts in half to make four pieces)

• 2-3 tbsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp oregano
• sea salt
• ground pepper

Basil Vinaigarette:

• 1/3 cup basil leaves
• 2 tbsp water
• 3 tbsp white balsamic vinegar
• 1 tsp rice wine vinegar
• 2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
• 2 tbsp chopped shallots
• salt & pepper to taste

Directions:

Place the marinade ingredients in a plastic bag and add the chicken.  Marinate the chicken in the refrigerator for 4-6 hours.

Combine all the vinaigrette ingredients in a food processor and pulse until smooth.  You can also use a blender if you don’t have a food processor but my suggestion is tell your kids, husband, significant other or whomever that you need a mini food processor.  It makes cooking so much easier.

After you’ve blended the ingredients, it will look like this.

Next you can grill your chicken any way you want to.  My husband wasn’t home to man the grill so I sprayed some nonstick cooking spray in a pan and cooked my chicken.  Maybe for Mother’s Day I’ll get an indoor grill…hint, hint.

After your chicken has rested a few minutes, slice it and start assembling your salad.  Drizzle the basil vinaigrette on top and enjoy!

 

What’s your favorite salad dressing?