Monday, June 02, 2008

Speedy salad with chicken, fresh cherries and a tangy goat cheese dressing...

More cherries please! Well, that is what Jeff has been saying the past few days anyway. I think I need to put them in a container that has a lock and key to keep him from snacking on them - at least until I get all these cherry recipes completed!

Of course I'll have a couple baked treats coming up this week, but today's cherry recipe used them in this Chicken Salad with Cherries and Goat-Cheese Dressing dish we had for dinner.

Quite creamy, the dressing is a mixture of crumbled fresh goat cheese, sour cream, mild chives and a couple splashes of white-wine vinegar. You'll need to add at least a tablespoon or two of water to thin it out enough so it will coat well - if you like your dressing on the thin side, you'll probably have to add a bit more. Honestly, it was hard to keep my little spoon out of it while I was "checking" for seasonings... very tangy and luscious.

We did have one issue, but it had nothing to do with the recipe. The chicken for this dish was suppose to be seared, but we were having some issues with our burners working correctly and wasn't able to prepare it that way. I would have preferred that golden finish on the thin cuts of chicken, but it was fine in the end. We really enjoyed the textures in this salad - torn tender leaves from the Boston lettuce, beautiful juicy cherries (simply halve them so they have firm presence in the salad) and crunchy pieces of toasted chopped walnuts worked in harmony together.

Now, this snazzy salad could be served a couple of ways - you could arrange everything in sections on the plate for a more dramatic presentation and allow you and your guests to simply toss the ingredients together as you eat. This is also particularly handy if you want to save a portion for leftovers! However, you could also just toss everything together in a big ol' bowl if you want to dig in right away.

10 comments:

  1. You are certainly making good use of those cherries! I would never have thought f pairing them with goats cheese but I can imagine it working well together.

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  2. That's beautiful Joe.....you've made a salad look like art!

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  3. This sounds great--I wonder if it would work with tofu in place of the chicken? I may have to try it...

    Courtney

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  4. Katie - I've had goat cheese and strawberries together before, so I was hoping this combo would be just as tasty!

    Quinn - Thank you!

    Courtney - possibly, as long as the tofu is well seasoned.

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  5. Yummm!!
    Do you think yogurt would work in place of the sour cream Joe? I know the sour cream has a different texture, but I don't usually have at home, but always have yogurt.
    And I looove goat cheese, so the dressing really appealed to me!
    Ana

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  6. Ana - A plain yogurt would probably be okay... I've used that sub before in other recipes and it seemed to work well.

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  7. Joe, I made this last night! OMG! So yummy. I gave you props on my blog...
    THANK YOU!
    Kandi

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  8. Kandi - Fantastic! Thanks for the feedback.

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  9. I've been a fan of your blog for a while now but was always too shy to post a comment...this salad was so good I had to let you know. The one changed I made was to use left over chicken from last night's dinner which was marinated in yogurt, lime juice, garlic, ginger, and Indian spices. The spice from the chicken with the creaminess from the goat cheese paired with the sweet cherries might just make this my new favorite salad. Thank you for the inspiration!

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  10. Hannah - I'm glad you decided to leave a comment! Happy to hear it went over well.

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