Recipes
Grilled Chicken Salad with Avocado, Jicama and Citrus
Source: The Washington Post, August 7, 2002
Servings: Makes 4 servings
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Chicken
- ½ cup freshly squeezed grapefruit juice
- ¼ cup honey
- ¼ cup mango chutney, such as Major Grey's
- 4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts (about 1 1/2 pounds)
- Coarse salt to taste
- Vegetable oil for brushing the grate
- Vinaigrette
- 1 tablespoon Dijon-style mustard
- 1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
- 1 tablespoon freshly squeezed lime juice
- 1 ½ teaspoons honey
- 1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh tarragon leaves
- 1 tablespoon snipped fresh chives
- ½ cup vegetable oil
- Salt to taste
- Salad
- 1 ripe avocado
- 1 lime, halved
- Salt to taste
- About 2 cups julienned jicama
- 4 oranges, sectioned*
- 2 grapefruits, sectioned*
- 4 scallions (white and tender green parts), thinly sliced
- ¼ cup (about 1 ounce) sliced or slivered almonds
- About 4 cups fresh spinach leaves, stemmed and washed
Instructions:
For the chicken: Preheat the grill on medium heat.
In a small bowl, combine the grapefruit juice, honey and chutney and stir well. Divide the marinade/basting sauce evenly between 2 bowls so you can safely use the contents of 1 bowl to baste the raw chicken while it cooks and reserve the other as a sauce to put on the chicken after it's cooked. Set aside.
Season both sides of the chicken lightly with salt. Brush the grate with oil. Grill the chicken for 4 minutes. Have 1 bowl of marinade/basting sauce ready. Turn and baste the chicken with some of the marinade/basting sauce and continue to cook, basting occasionally and turning the chicken as necessary until it is cooked through, 4 to 6 minutes longer. Be careful; the honey in the sauce will cause the chicken to scorch if you do not turn it frequently. Discard the rest of the basting sauce.
Transfer the chicken to a platter. Drizzle with a bit of the reserved marinade/basting sauce from the other bowl. Set aside to cool slightly. Reserve the remaining sauce. (May cover and refrigerate for up to 8 hours.)
For the vinaigrette: In a blender, combine the mustard, vinegar, lime juice and honey and process until combined. Add the tarragon and chives and pulse until blended. With the blender on low speed, slowly add the oil in a steady stream and process until emulsified. Season to taste with salt. Set aside.
For the salad: Cut the avocado in half and remove the pit. Using a large kitchen spoon, scoop the avocado from the skin. Thinly slice the avocado, squeeze the lime halves over the avocado, season with a pinch of salt and set aside.
In a bowl, combine the jicama and orange and grapefruit sections with the scallions and almonds. Set aside.
Have ready 4 plates or bowls. Arrange the spinach in the center of each plate. Set aside.
To serve: Thinly slice the chicken. Whisk the vinaigrette to recombine and drizzle it over the jicama, orange and grapefruit. Add the avocado and gently mix to combine. Spoon the salad onto the spinach and arrange the sliced chicken on top or around the edge. Drizzle the chicken with the reserved marinade/basting sauce.
* NOTE: To section citrus, use a large chef's knife to slice off both ends of the fruit. Stand the fruit on 1 end and slice downward along the curve of the fruit, cutting away both the peel and pith but leaving as much of the fruit as possible. Using a paring knife, cut between the sections to detach each section of fruit from its surrounding membrane.
Variations:
Note that the glaze for the chicken is more sweet than tart. You can cut back slightly on the amount of honey if you prefer a more tart glaze.