Warm Goat Cheese Salad

On this diet, I almost always make salads to go with our dinners. Since typically do not get carbs, I like to fool myself into thinking I am not missing them. Ask yourself, if your meal choice was either a chicken breast, sauteed squash & steamed green beans OR chicken breast sauteed squash & a Greek salad-which would you pick?

So I look for ways to make salads a little more fun than just your basic side salad.

IE:
Greek Salad: mixed greens, tomatoes, black olives, cucumbers, feta cheese. Balsamic Vinaigrette
Apple Cheddar Salad: Mixed greens, apples, cheddar cheese, balsamic vinaigrette.
Spinach Mushroom Salad: Spinach, mushrooms, red onions, Italian dressing

You get the idea. Just something to give us a better variety of vegetables. Sometimes I will even top them w/almonds or pecans. (I am crazy like that)

Anyway, 1 oz of goat cheese is equivalent to one dairy serving in this diet plan. I bought some to stuff into chicken but had some leftover & was trying to figure out what to make with it. I found this recipe on myrecipes.com

Warm Goat Cheese Salad

1/3 cup olive oil --> OMIT
1/3 cup lemon juice --> OMIT
1 tablespoon thinly sliced green onions --> OMIT
1 tablespoon honey --> OMIT
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard --> OMIT
1/2 cup Italian-seasoned breadcrumbs --> whole wheat breadcrumbs that I seasoned w/Italian Seasoning
1 1/2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
1 1/2 tablespoons sesame seeds --> OMIT
3 (4-oz.) goat cheese logs
1 large egg, lightly beaten --> 1/4 cupegg beaters
3 tablespoons butter --> OLIVE OIL
1 1/2 (5-oz.) packages sweet baby greens, thoroughly washed
12 pitted ripe olives, sliced --> OMIT


1. Whisk together first 5 ingredients.

2. Combine breadcrumbs, Parmesan cheese, and sesame seeds.

3. Cut each goat cheese log into 4 slices. Dip in egg, and dredge in breadcrumb mixture. Cover and chill 2 hours.

4. Melt butter in a medium skillet over medium-high heat. Fry goat cheese, in 2 batches, 1 to 2 minutes on each side or until browned; drain on paper towels.

5. Toss salad greens with olive oil mixture. Top with olives and warm goat cheese rounds.

As you can tell, this isn't very diet friendly. So I had to adjust. I didn't use their dressing-i just used a store bought low fat balsamic vinaigrette. I didn't chill the goat cheese (oops!) and i just drizzled a little olive oil in the pan to "fry" the logs.

This was really good & made my grilled chicken breast dinner a little fancier.