Chicken, Bacon & Avocado Chopped Salad

Wow. Almost an entire year has gone by since I last posted. A LOT has changed since September 2012. Our family of two has become a family of three and I am now a proud mommy to an (almost) eight-month-old beautiful baby boy! As you can imagine, he takes up most of my time (especially now that he's crawling) and I wouldn't have it any other way. I am still cooking and trying new recipes - and I'm ready to get back into the blogging world. Thank you to those who have encouraged me to do so :)

This recipe has become our favorite dinner salad. It is a great way to use up leftover chicken and/or bacon and you can use whatever fresh veggies you have on hand (e.g. those end-of-season tomatoes from your garden that are filling up entire buckets!) Oh, and the dressing is to die for! Credit goes to Ali from the blog, Gimme Some Oven.

Ingredients

Salad:

2 boneless, skinless chicken breasts

salt and pepper

1 Tbsp. olive oil

8 cups chopped Romaine lettuce (I used a spring mix)

8 slices bacon, cooked and broken into small pieces

4 ounces blue cheese, crumbled

2 avocados, pitted and sliced or diced 

2 roma tomatoes, sliced or diced

1/4 cup garlic vinaigrette (see recipe below)

 

Garlic Herb Vinaigrette:

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

3 garlic cloves, minced

1 Tbsp. Dijon mustard

1 Tbsp. dried Italian seasoning

1 1/2 cups extra virgin olive oil

salt and pepper, to taste

 

Directions

Season chicken breasts on both sides with salt and pepper. Heat oil in a large skillet over medium-high heat and add chicken. Cook until the chicken is no longer pink inside. Remove chicken and let rest for at least 10 minutes, then dice into small pieces.

 

Add the diced chicken, lettuce, bacon, blue cheese, avocados and tomatoes to a large bowl, and toss until combined. Drizzle or toss with garlic vinaigrette and serve immediately.

 

To make the vinaigrette, whisk all ingredients together until combined.