We’re still trying to eat a little healthier and going after some lighter fare for our Date Nights. Not that we’re totally eating diet food, but we are trying to scale back on the butter rich appetizers and heavy red meat and sauce reductions! So for our Date Night Dinner this Saturday evening, we went with a little Mediterranean fare starting with a Greek salad. That’s what I want to talk about here.
Dinner was baked Greek-style fish and roasted baby red potatoes, but that was as easy as it gets… Baked 4 fillets of tilapia coated in olive oil & Cavendars Greek Seasoning on 450° for about 10 minutes (for 1 inch thick fillets) and also roasted a handful of quartered red potatoes (also prepared in olive oil and Greek Seasoning). Brutally easy and really good. That’s a recipe for success!
But the salad was noteworthy because of the salad dressing. I’ve been trying out a variety of salad dressings for a while for Greek salads, both store bought and prepared from scratch and I’ve been yet to approximate any of the red wine vinegar dressings that I really like.
There’s the dressing from Nabeel’s that totally rocks. Then there’s one of my all time favorite red wine vinegarettes from Leonardo’s. It doesn’t get any better than that. Then there’s one of my new favorites at Joe’s Italian. It’s in the same league. But my homemade versions and Newman’s own (despite the contributions to charity) just aren’t there.
So I was poking around on-line for something that might work, since I was really in the mood for a good salad and ran across what is now going to be my “go to” house dressing on allrecipes.com.
Here’s the recipe, and you can also link to it on allrecipes.com and while you’re there, check out the totally cool feature that lets you scale this recipe up or down as you need (in my case I made 4 servings):
- 3 tablespoons and 1/2 teaspoon olive oil
- 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder
- 1/2 teaspoon dried oregano
- 1/2 teaspoon dried basil
- 1/2 teaspoon pepper
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
- 1/2 teaspoon Dijon-style mustard (I didn’t have any Dijon-style, so I used some spicy brown mustard. It was great and I imagine it will be even better next time when I make it with the Dijon style!)
- 1/4 cup and 1 teaspoon red wine vinega
And here’s a little something that’s very cool on AllRecipes.com:
We topped this off with a dessert of Greek Style yogurt and honey. That makes for a lighter and really delicious finale to a great Mediterranean Date Night Dinner. Bon Apetite!