Beet & Greens Salad with Sauted Chicken and a Garlic Yogurt Dressing

Taste: Sweet and earthy from the beets, a bit of bitterness from the greens, herbal, acidic and buttery from the dressing, pungent from the fresh garlic, the chicken lends a saltiness and richness and keeps the flavors grounded.

You can use canned beets for this, though somewhere down the line I’m sure I’ll roast some and see the contrast. So you need:

• prepared beets, chopped
• canned chickpeas
• boneless skinless chicken beasts, preferably fresh
• some goat-milk yogurt; some sour cream or Greek-style yogurt
• fresh dillweed and parsley (you can also throw in mint if you like it)
• garlic (fresh, not powdered)
• fresh lemon juice
• red wine vinegar
• a good fruity olive oil
• fresh mesclun mix with some spinach thrown in
• you’ll also need salt, pepper, and paprika hot or sweet, as you like.

Pat dry the chicken breasts and trim off any fat, season well with salt and pepper, pressing the salt into the meat, preheat a small skillet, (not nonstick) and put a tiny bit of oil and let it get nice a hot, then put the chicken breasts in, (you can go about the rest of the recipe at that point, just keep an eye on them), you want them to get nice and seared on both sides, then deglaze with some chicken broth if you have it handy, or just water, white wine would probably work nicely as well. Reduce the heat and cover to cook the chicken the rest of the way through. You can check this but cutting into the chicken, once the meat is close to done, but still not fully opaque, remove the lid and let the liquid reduce, then set aside and let it cool down a bit.

For the dressing, you mince the garlic, fine as you can, whisk together the sour cream (or yogurt), garlic, yogurt and some olive oil, pepper and salt to taste, finely chop the herbs and add them into the mix, taste it and see if it needs more salt or pepper, or something else I haven’t thought of. Let that sit at least for 30 mins so everything can meld.

Put the chickpeas in a bowl and mush them just a bit with a fork so they aren’t all whole, salt, pepper, red wine vinegar to taste and olive oil, add some more finely chopped parsley, let that sit as well.

Arrange your greens in your serving bowls, top with the chickpeas, then top withe the chopped beets and drizzle the yogurt dressing liberally over. Chop up the chicken and while it’s still hot season with the paprika more more pepper if you like, arrange it on top of the salad, try to get it over the beets and the chickpeas, which wont wilt from the heat like the fresh salad will, drizzle some of the reduction from the pan over the chicken, and eat.