Recipe Renovation: How to Slim Down Your Cobb Salad!
Fattening foods are often hidden in healthy-seeming foods… and there's no better example than the ever-popular Cobb salad. Who doesn't want a Cobb salad for lunch? But who wants to gain weight eating (wait for it!) over 1,000 calories per lunch from a salad?
Bethenny believes in renovating recipes to wind up with a still-yummy, but less indulgent version. Her Cobb has fewer than half the calories of a regular Cobb… and it still tastes amazing.
Healthier Cobb Salad
Cobb salads give salad a bad name. In many restaurants, this salad is just a big pile of bacon, chicken, blue cheese, hard-boiled eggs, avocado, and ranch dressing over a little bit of lettuce. I don't even want to think about how much fat is in a typical Cobb salad and dressing at a restaurant.
I'm not mad at Cobb salad - I order it sometimes and eat a small quantity, however, what I love about the Cobb salad is that it was originally invented to use up leftovers. If you love the Cobb salad taste and you want to lighten it up, try this recipe. It's quick and easy when you've got leftover chicken and turkey bacon - and, of course, you can always make your own version, according to what leftovers you have. Nothing says it absolutely has to be chicken and bacon, and for the dressing, try the ranch and vinaigrette combination that I recommend.
Makes 8 serving as an entrée, 12 as a side salad
Ingredients
6 hearts of romaine, chopped
1 small package turkey bacon (about 6 ounces) cooked in the microwave until crisp and crumbled
Shredded white meat from a purchased 2-pound rotisserie chicken
2 pints pear tomatoes, halved or quartered
10 ounces Danish blue cheese (Danablu), crumbled
3 avocados, halved, pitted, scored into cubes, and removed with a spoon
5 hard-boiled egg whites, coarsely chopped
3/4 cup purchased low-fat ranch dressing or half low-fat ranch mixed with half light vinaigrette
Bethenny's Tips
Arrange the romaine on plates or on a serving platter. Arrange the salad ingredients in stripes over the lettuce, then drizzle the dressing in stripes over the top.
Use-What-You-Have Variations
Use any of these variations, or mix and match them according to taste.
Variation 1: Instead of romaine, try any crispy leafy salad green.
Variation 2: Instead of turkey bacon, try chopped Canadian bacon, crumbled veggie bacon, chopped lean ham, smaller amount of regular bacon (about 4 ounces)
Variation 3: Instead of chicken, try any chopped shredded, or cubed beef, poultry, shrimp, or tofu.
Variation 4: Instead of pear tomatoes, try any other kind or color of tomato.
Variation 5: Instead of blue cheese, try any strongly flavored crumbled or shredded cheese.
Variation 6: Instead of avocados, try 1 cup chopped artichoke hearts, or 1 cup sliced hearts of palm.
Variation 7: Instead of hard-boiled egg whites, try 1/2 cup crumbled extra-firm tofu.
Variation 8: Instead of low-fat ranch mixed with light vinaigrette, try 1/2 cup low-fat ranch mixed with a squeeze of fresh lemon juice, salt and pepper, and 1/4 cup water. Light vinaigrette only, try a drizzle of olive oil and fresh lemon juice seasoned with salt and pepper.
More From Bethenny:
Comfort Food Made Healthy: Cauliflower Mashed Potatoes
Comfort Food Made Healthy: Skinny Fried Chicken
Bethenny's Low-Cal Ranch Dressing
