Grilled Steak Salad with a Balsamic Reduction Dressing

                                  

Here's to summer! Again, I am making salad for dinner, and I am A-OK with this. I literally have grilled steak for dayz in my freezer, and I need to find ways to eat it because one can only have fajitas and omelets for so many meals, lol. Insert tonight's salad.

For salad you will need:

3 hearts of Romaine, washed, dried and chopped

2 cups of Baby Spinach

2 zucchini, washed, quartered lengthwise, and chopped

1/2 of a large, sweet onion, roughly chopped

2 Bell Peppers, seeded, and chopped into 1-inch pieces (I used a red and a yellow)

Baby Heirloom Tomatoes (be sure to cut the larger ones in half)

2 TBS of extra virgin olive oil

sea salt and pepper to taste

Grilled skirt steak (choose your marinade, mine had been marinated in a carne asada marinade), grilled and sliced.

Place chopped Romaine and Spinach into a large salad bowl. Heat olive oil in a large skillet, add zucchini and onion, and season lightly with salt and pepper. Sauté until it begins to lightly brown. Remove from heat and set aside.

If your steak is left over like mine was, add it to the pan to reheat. 

For the dressing:

1/2 cup of balsamic vinegar

1 TBS whole grain mustard

Extra Virgin Olive Oil

2 TBS Raw Organic Honey

pinch of sea salt

6 grinds of freshly ground pepper

Pour Balsamic into a small saucepan, and place over med-high heat. Bring to a boil, and simmer until reduced by approximately 1/3. Remove from heat and place in a bowl, and add the honey, mustard, salt and pepper. Whisk to combine, and slowly begin to drizzle in the olive oil. Start with 1/3 of a cup. You don't want a ton of oil, just enough for the dressing to emulsify. 

Finishing the salad:

Top the salad greens with the sautéed zucchini, onions, bell peppers, and tomatoes, and give a slight toss to combine. To serve, mound the salad up on your plate top with steak, and drizzle with the Balsamic dressing. This would be REALLY good with some crumbled goat cheese, and sautéed or grilled mushrooms too, I just didn't have any on hand. Maybe next time. If you do make it with the shrooms and goat cheese, please let me know if you like it!

Caesar Salad...with Shrimp

I love salads in the summer. I don't necessarily like to make them, because I really don't like having to wash the lettuce (weak excuse I know), but for some reason, a salad at a restaurant tastes so much better and I think it is because I didn't have to make it and clean up the mess. At any rate, my favorite salad is Caesar Salad. In another life, I loved the seasoned, buttery, toasted croutons...and I still do, unfortunately, they do not love me back. So, last night I decided to try my hand at making a Caesar Salad that I could eat and enjoy. I originally wanted to make a grilled chicken one because we have literally tons of left over grilled meat from a party we had a few weeks ago that we bagged up and put into the freezer. Unfortunately, I discovered the chicken has since disappeared, and I wasn't quite feeling a steak Caesar. So, shrimp it is.

Dressing:

4 large cloves of garlic, peeled and smashed

2 tsp of dijon mustard 

2 TBS of mayonnaise (Here is a great homemade mayo that utilizes a cooked egg yolk if you're a germaphobe like me)

1/2 cup of extra virgin olive oil

1 tsp of anchovy paste

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/4 tsp of freshly ground pepper

Place all ingredients into a high power blender, and blend. Seriously, it is that easy. Pour dressing into jar and place in fridge until you are ready to make your salad. 

Parmesan Crisps:

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Line a baking sheet with either a silicone baking pad or parchment paper. (I used a silicone baking pad on my baking sheet, but parchment paper works too.) Place tablespoons of grated Parmigiano Reggiano cheese on your lined baking sheet, and lightly spread out into circles, but still in a slight mound. See picture below:

Place into oven, and bake for about 10 minutes until they have melted down, and the edges are beginning to brown. Remove from oven, and let cool, then carefully remove from the pan and place on paper towels to soak up oil. Set aside until you are ready to assemble the salad.

For the Salad:

1 clove of garlic, peeled and smashed

3 heads of romaine lettuce, washed, drained, and chopped

Grated Parmigiano Reggiano

Caesar Dressing (recipe above)

Take the smashed garlic and rub all over the inside of your salad bowl, and discard, or save for something else like the dressing if you haven't already made it. If you are being authentic, use a wooden bowl (besides, they just look so much cooler!). Place your chopped romaine in the bowl, drizzle dressing over and toss well. Add a couple of tablespoons of the cheese, and toss some more. I reserved a little dressing to drizzle over my salad before I ate it. 

Plate the salad and top with a Parmesan Crisp and if you are using meat, add your choice of grilled meat.

For this salad, I used shrimp that I pre marinated in my Greek dressing (which is in an earlier post on this blog), and grilled on my grill pan. 

This really was a satisfying salad, and I really didn't miss the croutons. I hope that you try it and like it. :)