The creation of this grilled salad was the result of a strange collection of leftovers in my refrigerator: grilled veggies from dinner the night before, a tiny bit of pesto, and a bunch or sad looking roma tomatoes that needed to get used up.  I am glad my less than inspiring odds and ends led me here. The addition of the goat cheese and truffle oil made luxury out of leftover. The grilled veggie salad with goat cheese and white truffle oil is now a regular dinner at my house paired with a basic meat/fish and a nice potato or grain as a side.

This is a dinner party worthy salad that can be prepped ahead of time with minimal assembly required during the party.  Each component helps make this a memorable dish your most discriminating guest will remember. Also the roasted goat cheese tomatoes placed on a crostini can make a delicious hot appetizer for any cocktail party.

Grilled Veggie Salad with Goat Cheese and White Truffle Oil

Ingredients

For the Grilled Vegetables

  • 1 pint large mushrooms
  • 1-2 onions
  • 1-3 of your favorite squash
  • Olive oil
  • Favorite poultry spice or season salt
  • Salt & Pepper

For the Roasted Goat Cheese Tomatoes

  • 6-8 medium or roma tomatoes
  • 3 Tbsp of chimichurri pesto, Italian salsa verde or other similar fresh green sauce
  • 4 oz goat cheese
  • Cooking spray

For the Salad

  • 6-8 cups of mixed lettuces butter, endive, romaine, etc
  • Juice of a lemon
  • Salt and pepper
  • 1-2 tbsp fresh basil Chiffonade
  • 1.5 tbsp of white truffle oil

Instructions

Grilled Vegetables

  1. Clean the veggies and prep for the grill. The mushrooms I grill whole in a veggie basket so after wiping them off I drizzle with olive oil and the add pepper and seasoning salt (I have an obsession with Adobo Salt from Goya it’s a jazzed up garlic salt) and they are ready to hit the grill.
  2. The onions I slice into large rings so they are easy to flip on the grill and give them the same olive oil and spice treatment as the mushrooms. Same prep for the yellow squash. You could substitute or add any almost any veggie to your grill mix: eggplant, baby artichokes, or green onions, be creative.
  3. On the hot grill the onion and squash will go pretty quick so keep an eye on them, time will depend on how thick you cut them. The mushrooms will need to roast until they release their water and darken up. So about 6 minutes.
  4. Set the grilled veggies aside and allow them to cool so you can slice into bite sized pieces. You can grill and prep the veggies hours or days before you plan to serve this salad. I normally will grill extra veggies one night with the plan of making this salad the next.

Roasted Goat Cheese Tomatoes

  1. Slice the tomatoes into thick rounds and arrange on a sprayed baking sheet. Salt and pepper both sides and then put a dot of green sauce on each tomato then a dollop of the goat cheese.
  2. You can grill these, cheese side up, if you have a steady hand and lighting quick moves on the grill, but I often just pop the sheet tray in a toaster or regular oven. Using the oven is especially nice if you have pre made the other veggies and don’t want to pull out the grill just for the tomatoes. Cook in the oven at 400 for 6 minutes until tomatoes soften and the cheese browns slightly.

Assemble the Salad

  1. Place the cleaned lettuce in a large bowl and toss lightly with half the lemon juice, truffle oil, basil, and salt and pepper. Taste the lettuce and adjust spicing until the salad has a good flavor. Use the remaining lemon juice on the grilled veggies, also taste each of them and adjust spices as needed. Artfully arrange the grilled veggies and tomatoes on top the greens and serve.

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