Italian Chicken Salad with Vegetables, Cranberries and Goat Cheese

I have a delicious salad for you on this glorious Monday.

It’s not really all that glorious today but I thought it would help if I typed it out.

Oh Mondays…

Talk about starting the week off right with a salad though! This Italian Chicken Salad with Vegetables, Cranberries and Goat Cheese may possibly be one of my favorite salads to date.

A few weeks back we met up with some family friends at my sister-in-law’s house and Andrea brought this gorgeous salad. I took one bite and immediately knew I needed the recipe.

It’s everything you want in a salad. EVERYTHING. It’s crunchy, sweet, slightly salty, peppery, tangy. I could go on and on. Plus it’s beautiful and filling. So winning. There are a tons of vitamins and healthy stuff going on this salad from the arugula and fresh spring greens to the diced chicken, celery, avocado, and red peppers. Oh there’s more though. There’s also goat cheese and dried cranberries too.

And the dressing is homemade. Well sort of. It’s start out with a packet of Good Seasons Italian dressing mix then you go from there. It’s Andrea’s mom’s recipe and it’s amazing. It’s super zesty and slightly sweet…goes really well with all the crunchy vegetables. Better than any store bought dressing, let me tell ya.

Salads are typically pretty easy to make…chop, mix, and dress. This one is no different. Andrea actually served this without diced chicken because we were also having pizza. It twas zee perfect side salad. I added chicken to make a meal out of for dinner last week. I’m also thinking shrimp or event steak would be darn good in this salad with some of that Good Seasons Italian dressing sprinkled on it.

Start this week off right and start chopping!

Italian Chicken Salad with Vegetables, Cranberries and Goat Cheese

 

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Prep time

15 mins

Cook time

8 mins

Total time

23 mins

 

Stuckonsweet.com: Jessica from www.stuckonsweet.com

Recipe type: Salad

Serves: 4

Ingredients

• large handful of fresh arugula, roughly chopped
• large handful of mixed greens, roughly chopped
• 2 large handfuls of romaine lettuce, roughly chopped
• 2 celery sticks, diced
• 1 red bell pepper, diced
• 1 large cucumber, peeled then diced
• 1 cup cherry tomatoes, diced
• 1 avocado, diced
• 1 container goat cheese
• 1½ cups dried cranberries
• 2 chicken breasts seasoned with salt and pepper

Dressing

• 1 pack of Good Seasons Italian Dressing Mix
• ¼ cup olive oil
• a little less than ¼ cup of balsamic vinegar
• 1 teaspoon granulated sugar
• 1 clove of garlic, minced (1 teaspoon minced)
• Pinch of salt and pepper

Instructions

1. Make the dressing by adding all of the ingredient to a bowl and whisk. Set aside to let flavors come together.
2. Add olive oil to sauté pan and place over medium-high heat. Add chicken breasts and cook until no longer pink, about 3-4 minutes per side. Set aside to cool then cut into chunks. You could also buy a rotisserie chicken and use the meat from that.
3. Once all of the ingredients are prepared, add them to a large bowl, gently mix and serve with Italian dressing.

Notes

Measurements for this salad are estimates. Feel free to add more of less of any ingredient as you can't really mess it up. If you decide to make a larger salad, double the dressing recipe.

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