Over the weekend my husband & I went to my all-time favorite restaurant, The Cheesecake Factory. I crave their Bang Bang Chicken & Shrimp early daily and could eat their every week if I had my way. Besides that amazing Thai Dish, we absolutely are in love with their Avocado Egg Rolls. After we finished the egg rolls, I had to restrain myself from licking out the bowl of the cilantro dipping sauce. As I was licking my fingers the wheels in my head started turning, wanting to come up with a salad recipe that I could smother that dressing on. Well…thanks to Google, I found about 10 recipes claiming they had ‘the’ exact recipe for their dipping sauce. Not so! Each one was either too spicy, too salty, too boring or too sweet. Thanks to a little playing around in the kitchen I think I have it just about perfect. Instead of serving this sauce with egg rolls (a little too fattening for a summer dish–although bring that on during New Years!!), it went amazing on this Turkey Southwestern-style Cobb Salad. Feel free to use grilled chicken if you have that around the house, or really any ingredients you wish to add. This dressing would be good on just about anything!
Added bonus, this salad is perfect for feeding a large crowd. The colors scream summer, it’s light, flavorful, healthy and darn pretty if I do say so myself 😉
- Turkey Bacon Cobb Salad with Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette
- 4 c. baby spinach
- 4-6 c. romaine lettuce, chopped
- 2 tomatoes, diced
- 3 stalks green onions, sliced
- 1/2 c. cilantro, lightly chopped
- 3/4 c. feta or queso cheese (feta was fabulous!)
- 1 c. frozen corn, thawed
- 1 can black beans, drained and rinsed
- 1/2 yellow bell pepper, diced
- 1/2 orange bell pepper, diced
- 1/2 lb. bacon, cooked and crumbled
- 2 c. cooked and cubed turkey or chicken, seasoned with salt & pepper
- Tortilla chips, garnish
- Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette
- 1/2 c. olive oil
- 1/2 c. white vinegar
- 2 T. lime juice
- 1 T. balsamic vinegar
- 1 t. soy sauce
- Dash of cayenne pepper (or more if you like more spice)
- 2 T. almonds or cashews, minced
- 2 t. cumin
- 2 t. black pepper
- 4 T. green onions
- 1/2 c. honey
- 2 T. sugar
- 2/3 c. cilantro, chopped
- Place all of the ingredients in a food processor and puree until completely smooth. If you don't have a food processor, use a hand wand or anything you can find to make this dressing smooth. With the nuts and cilantro, it takes a few minutes to get it pureed nice and smooth. If you don't have one of these, just make sure and chop your heart out with the nuts, green onions and cilantro to make your dressing as smooth as you can.
- For the salad, layer on a large platter, or in a bowl, the lettuce and spinach. Top the spinach and lettuce with all of the toppings. You can do this 'cobb' style, or just place everything in a large bowl and mix. Serve the salad with the dressing when ready to serve. Garnish with extra tortilla chips and cilantro.
- Place all of the dressing ingredients in a food processor and puree until completely smooth. If you don't have a food processor, use a hand wand or anything you can find to make this dressing smooth. With the nuts and cilantro, it takes a few minutes to get it pureed nice and smooth. If you don't have one of these, just make sure and chop your heart out of the nuts, green onions and cilantro to make sure your dressing is as smooth as you can.
- For the salad, layer on a large platter, or in a bowl, the lettuce and spinach. Top the spinach and lettuce with all of the toppings. You can do this 'cobb' style, or just place everything in a large bowl and mix. Serve the salad with the dressing when ready to serve. Garnish with extra tortilla chips and cilantro.
Hi Shandra:) Do you ever use your blog-posted, amazingly yummy-sounding recipes in the weekly menu plan, or do you keep the blog recipes and meal-plan recipes separate?
Great question! Yes, I do use my blog recipes in the meal planner. I usually create the recipes, blog about them and then add them the next week or so to the meal planner 😉 Thanks for a great question & comment 😉