More Cheese More Chocolate: Greek Salad

After all the deliciously unhealthy junk I ate on the day of the Super Bowl (yeah, I'm talking to you, bacon-wrapped pretzels), I really, really needed to eat something healthy. I could barely make it through Monday with the vicious junk food hangover I was experiencing, and my only salvation was the giant salad I made for dinner.

I was kind of trying to replicate the Greek salad I frequently ate for lunch when I worked in Chicago. It was at a local restaurant chain called Pockets, at the location conveniently across the street from my office. I'm kind of embarrassed by how often I went there because the food isn't super high-quality, but it's healthy and I was obsessed with their Greek dressing. And they had friendly employees who remembered my order and sometimes gave me free stuff.

To make the salad, preheat the oven to 350 and rinse and dry 2-3 chicken breasts. I poured a little Italian dressing in a baking dish, put a few chicken breasts in, and poured a little more dressing over the top.

Sprinkle on a little oregano, salt, and pepper. Bake for 30-45 minutes until it is cooked through.

For the greens I used romaine and a tiny bit of spinach that I needed to use up. If you want shredded lettuce, start by placing a few pieces of lettuce on a cutting board.

Roll them into a log. A lettuce log.

And slice away.

Here's what you should end up with. You can slice it again lengthwise if you don't want really long strips of lettuce.

Once you have as much lettuce you want, add:

1/2 cucumber, sliced

3/4 cup tomatoes, chopped

1/4-1/2 cup black olives, sliced

1/2 cup feta

1/2 cup red onion, diced (optional)

*This was the perfect amount for two entree salads. Not giant, choke-a-horse entree salads, but reasonable entree salads.

The dressing was the part I was most concerned about. I haven't had the Pockets Greek dressing for a good year and a half now, so my memory is slightly hazy as to what all was in it. I do remember there being feta and capers in it. I think. I started out with a base of about 1/2 cup Italian dressing and added about a tablespoon of feta, a teaspoon of capers, half a teaspoon of oregano, salt and pepper. I was certainly not a bad dressing, but it was not what I had envisioned. It was kind of sweet and a little too creamy.

I made a similar salad for lunch today, and I was much happier with my dressing result. Instead of using the Italian dressing as the base I used a mixture of oil, vinegar, and a little dijon mustard. Then I threw in some capers, salt & pepper. I would use this dressing instead of the Italian-based on in the picture.