Strawberry Salad with Goat Cheese Croutons and Strawberry Black Pepper and Poppyseed Vinaigrette

Strawberry season in Minnesota might be one of my favorite times for our garden. While we get lettuce and radish and even rhubarb earlier in the spring, strawberries with their succulent sweet flavor and bright red color seem to be the first bountiful thing that we get.  While many nights we will pick a bowl of the strawberries that have ripened that day and just enjoy them as a dessert, I also like to use the strawberries in savory applications.   Salads are a natural way to do this, especially because my garden lettuce is usually going at full strength about this time too.

A normal salad for me looks like a strawberry vinaigrette, grilled chicken, slices strawberries, other veggies like onion and avocado with nuts and crumbled feta or goat cheese – whichever we have on hand. This is a dressed-up version of my standard with fried goat cheese croutons!

It’s been so long since the first time we made this salad that I don’t even remember the inspiration for making fried goat cheese croutons to put on top, but wherever the idea came from, wow was it a good one.

Take everything about the normal amazing strawberry salad I love so much and add a warm, creamy, crunchy on the outside pillow of goat cheese into the bite and it’s a game changer.  It elevates the salad into something special.

Even if you aren’t as into the strawberry salad as I am, I encourage you to try the recipe for the goat cheese croutons in another application – a different salad, they’d be great with a simple salad with a balsamic vinaigrette, something with peaches, or even with a little fig jam on a crostini for an appetizer.

Here’s what you need:

Start by slicing a log of goat cheese into slices.  Then slightly flatten the slices and push together any crumbly bits. Place on a waxed paper lined sheet tray and pop into the freezer.  You want them to be cold when you fry them.

We’re going to fry the goat cheese at the very end so now is when you prep your lettuce, make the dressing, cut the veggies and cook your chicken.

The dressing starts by macerating the strawberries with some sugar and black pepper.  This will soften the strawberries for the dressing (but when you have really fresh garden strawberries they don’t always need it – grocery store berries definitely benefit from it) and marinate them too.

Add sliced strawberries to a bowl along with some sugar and fresh ground black pepper.  Stir together and set aside to macerate while you work on the rest of the salad.

Slice up the fixings for your salad.  I am using cucumber, red onion, avocado and of course – more strawberries.

You’ll also want to prep your lettuce.  I have fresh from the garden lettuce that I am just tearing.  But wash and cut your lettuce as you see fit based on what you have.  Loose leaf, spinach or romaine all work well.

I also grilled the chicken (not pictured) as I like it room temp in my salads and knew I didn’t want to balance grilling the chicken while trying to fry the goat cheese.

Time for the dressing, you’ll want either a small blender or an immersion blender, which is my favorite tool for salads.   Add the macerated sliced strawberries, white wine vinegar and a pinch of salt and few grinds of black pepper to the blending cup of your immersion blender or a similar tall container.  Blend together.  Then slowly stream in olive oil while blending.

Taste and adjust vinegar, oil, salt or pepper.  Tasting is an important piece of making homemade dressing. There is a standard ratio of 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar that’s fairly accepted, however, you need to account for personal taste (my husband often prefers a higher ratio of vinegar) and also the other ingredients (if your strawberries are very sweet and ripe you might want a touch more vinegar). You don’t have to like the same dressing ratios I do and you should feel empowered to taste and change along the way – I do it with most dressing recipes I try for the first time or when I’m just throwing together a random dressing without a recipe!

Then stir in your poppy seeds.

Now that the rest of our salad fixings are complete, it’s time to make the croutons.

Start by setting up three bowls or shallow dishes for your breading station.  Add a little flour to the first bowl.   One egg and a splash of milk in the second bowl that you will then whisk together.  The final bowl will have panko bread crumbs that I seasoned with black pepper and salt.

Start by tossing the goat cheese in the flour to coat it.

Shake or tap off the excess flour and then dip the goat cheese into the egg mixture.

Coat in panko mixture and then place back on the same sheet pan you froze the goat cheese on.

Find a saucepan or sautepan that’s wide enough to fit all of your goat cheese and fill the bottom with oil.  We are going to shallow fry not deep fry.

Heat the oil over medium heat and when it’s hot enough that a panko crumb sizzles when you put it in, it’s ready.  The oil will be too shallow to use a thermometer, although if you have an infrared thermometer, I found that works relatively well – in that case look for 350 degrees.

Add the breaded goat cheese to the oil.

After a 45 to 90 seconds, check to see if they are browning and flip when golden.  Continue cooking until the second side is golden, about 45 seconds.   Watch for it to be brown as your oil may be at a slightly different temp.

Transfer to paper towel to drain.

Build your salad.  I like to first lightly dress my greens before topping with the chicken, cucumber, avocado, onion and strawberries.  Finally top with the gooey crunchy goat cheese.

Strawberry Sald with Goat Cheese Croutons and Strawberry Black Pepper and Poppyseed Vinaigrette

 

Print

Prep time

30 mins

Cook time

20 mins

Total time

50 mins

 

A fresh strawberry salad with a black pepper strawberry vinaigrette that is topped with crunchy, gooey goat cheese croutons.

Author: Gravel & Dine

Recipe type: Salads

Serves: 2 salads

Ingredients

• 1 small log of goat cheese
• 1 ½ c strawberries, sliced and divided
• 2 t – 1 T sugar (use less if you have juicy in season strawberries and more if you have grocery store strawberries)
• 1 t Black pepper
• 2 T White wine vinegar
• 6 T Extra virgin olive oil
• Salt
• 1 t Poppy seeds
• Loose leaf lettuce, approx. 2 cups per salad
• 1 8 oz (give or take) chicken breast, cooked and chopped
• Red onion, approx. ⅓ c thinly sliced
• Cucumber, approx. ⅓ c chopped
• ½ avocado, diced
• ¼ to ⅓ c flour
• 1 egg
• 2 T milk
• 1 c panko breadcrumbs
• Oil for frying

Instructions

1. Slice goat cheese into 12 slices and pat the slices out until they form neat circles, pushing together any crumbly bits. Place goat cheese on a waxed paper lined baking sheet and freeze.
2. Place approximately a half cup of strawberries, sugar and add a few grinds of black pepper. Stir together and set aside. Allow to macerate while you cook the chicken and prep the veggies – 15 to 20 minutes.
3. Cook the chicken – season with salt and pepper or your favorite herb mix. Chop into bite sized pieces. Prep your veggies and lettuce.
4. Blend the strawberries and accumulated juices along with the white wine vinegar, salt and pepper until the strawberries become a puree. Continue blending while you stream in the olive oil. Taste and season with additional salt or pepper as needed. Stir in poppyseeds.
5. Prepare a breading station using three dishes. Add flour to the first dish. Whisk milk and egg together in the second. To the third dish add panko and season with salt and pepper.
6. Remove goat cheese from the freezer and coat in the flour. Keep the pan to place the breaded goat cheese back on.
7. Tap off excess flour and drip goat cheese into egg mixture.
8. Coat in panko and return to sheet pan.
9. In a pan big enough to hold all the goal cheese add a layer of oil to the bottom.. Heat over medium heat until a panko crumb sizzles, about 350 degrees if you have an infrared thermometer to measure.
10. Add the goat cheese and fry, flipping once until both sides are golden. This will take about 45-90 seconds per side depending on how hot your oil is.
11. Remove to paper towels to drain.
12. Build the salad by first tossing the lettuce with dressing. Top with chicken, cucumber, onion, avocado and strawberries and finally goat cheese. Drizzle on more dressing as desired.

Wordpress Recipe Plugin by EasyRecipe

3.5.3251