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- Hey guys its Natasha of natashaskitchen.com.
It's just an absolutely gorgeous spring day.
We've got the windows open,
the breeze is flowing through the house
and it's a perfect day to cook something great.
Today we're making the creamy spinach salad
with chicken and baby tomatoes.
It's a great recipe.
So let's go over the ingredients.
You'll need a six ounce bag of fresh spinach,
one tablespoon of lemon juice,
three tablespoons of mayo,
six strips of bacon,
two chicken breasts with salt and pepper,
ten ounces of baby tomatoes,
two tablespoons of chopped green onion,
and a cup to a cup and a half of croutons.
Start by preheating your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit
then line a rimmed baking sheet with foil
and just put your bacon right on top.
You're going to bake your bacon for about
15 to 20 minutes depending on how crispy you want it
and I'll probably put a little more than six pieces of bacon
because I'll probably eat a couple myself.
While your Bacon's in the oven start prepping your chicken.
You're going to pre-heat your stove to medium high heat,
trim the fat and all the yucky stuff off of your chicken,
and then I like to cut it in half
and that way it cooks faster.
So just slice it down the middle
so you get some nice thinner pieces of chicken breast
and do the same with both chicken breasts.
Then you're going to sprinkle both sides
of the chicken breast with salt and pepper.
Drizzle about two tablespoons of olive oil
into your pot skillet,
then transfer your chicken into the pan
and let that cook until golden brown
on both sides and fully cook through.
Our chicken's done so go ahead
and just transfer it to a cutting board
and let it cool to room temperature.
Our bacon just came out of the oven.
You can see it's nice and crisp
so just transfer it to some paper towels
and let that cool to room temperature.
We want the paper towels to really soak up
all that extra grease.
As you can see I made a lot more than six strips
because I'm planning to eat the rest.
No, not really, I won't eat all of them but I love bacon.
Great for sandwiches and this baking method is really great
because it frees up your stove for other things.
You're going to chop about two tablespoons of green onion.
Just finely slice it up,
then rinse and cut all of your tomatoes in half.
You can use either grape tomatoes or cherry tomatoes,
both work.
You're going to chop your chicken
until about half inch cubes.
Chop the bacon into about half inch pieces.
Ah, do you hear that crunch?
Yum.
Yum yum yum.
Now on to my favorite part of this entire recipe.
It's the creamy spinach salad dressing.
It's amazing how much spinach actually goes into this
and then it's just a little bit of mayo
and a little bit of lemon juice.
You mix everything together in the food processor
and it's delicious.
You can also use this dressing on other salad recipes
so if you do experiment, let me know.
Start out by just packing your spinach
into your food processor.
Pack about a third of your spinach leaves
into your food processor and pack them down.
Then add one tablespoon of fresh squeezed lemon juice,
and three tablespoons of mayonnaise.
And I used an olive oil mayonnaise,
but you can use a regular mayo.
I used regular before and it tasted great.
Works with bowl.
Then put the lid on,
let that blend for a while
and then add more spinach until it's all fully blended
and minced together.
Alright it's done.
See it's a beautiful creamy green texture
just like a superfood.
Add all of your ingredients to a salad bowl.
So your chicken, your bacon,
then we have our chopped tomatoes,
our green onion,
and make sure you don't forget your croutons
so again about a cup and a half of croutons.
And finally your dressing, just pour it over the top.
Pretty green.
Then we're going to mix everything to combine.
Doesn't it look pretty?
It looks like Christmas.
And that's it.
There you have it.
Our creamy spinach salad with chicken and baby tomatoes.
And this is how you get your kids to eat their spinach.
David, is it delicious?
Yeah?
You like that?
Good.
Is it healthy?
Yeah.
- [Dad] Does it taste like candy?
- No.
Now I get to enjoy the sweater and my salad.
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