This Grilled Onion Roasted Potato Strawberry Spinach Salad has a little sweet, a little salty and all the flavors! A lemon thyme balsamic brings it all together.
Preheat the oven to 400° and place a large, rimmed baking dish on the middle rack to preheat. [Yes, this is the secret to crispy baked potatoes!]
While your oven preheats, cut up your potatoes into small pieces (~ ½ inch cubes) and place in a medium mixing bowl.
Chop the rosemary for the potatoes and the chicken. Add approximately 1.5 tablespoons of rosemary, two large three-finger pinches of kosher salt, and ½ teaspoon freshly ground pepper to your potatoes.
Drizzle olive oil over the potatoes and toss to coat potatoes evenly. The potatoes should have a nice sheen but they should not be drenched. There should be no excess oil in the bottom of the bowl.
By this time your oven should be preheated. If not, proceed to assembling the balsamic reduction and preparing your chicken for the grill.
If it is preheated, then spread the potatoes out in an even layer on the hot pan. Bake until they are a golden brown and are break apart when pierced with a fork, stirring every 8-10 minutes. Mine take about 30 minutes but this will greatly depend on how large your potatoes are.
While the potatoes bake, start your balsamic reduction.
Balsamic Lemon Thyme Reduction:
Add all ingredients except thyme in a small sauce pan. Whisk until all the honey has dissolved. Add the thyme sprigs and place over medium-high heat. .
Stir occasionally, and reduce until the sauce is thick enough to coat the back of a spoon but still thin enough to run off the edges. It will be a little bit more than ½ cup
Once it has reduced, remove it from the heat and take out the thyme sprigs. By my timing this is just a little bit before the onions are done.
After your Reduction has gone on the stove, prepare your chicken, chop your strawberries and slice your onions.
Making the chicken:
While your balsamic reduction is reducing and your potatoes have about 10 minutes left, start cooking your chicken. Follow the instructions in this rosemary chicken recipe.
Grilling the onions:
While your chicken is resting switch your oven to broil and place the oven rack as close to the broiler as possible without your pan actually touching the coils.
Place onion slices in a single layer on your hot grill pan that you just used for your chicken, brush the tops with olive oil reserved from brushing your pan for the chicken, sprinkle with salt and pepper. Place under the broiler for 2 minutes.
Flip the slices over and broil another 2 minutes.
With tongs separate the slices, toss, and continue broiling until crisp-tender or more done if you desire, about 4 minutes more, checking at 1-minute intervals.
Assemble your Salads:
There is inevitably downtime while waiting on one of the cooked components to be ready, so during that time, I chop my spinach, dice my strawberries, cut up my avocado, stir my reduction, and eat some goat’s cheese. Oops! I meant get my cheese ready to top the salads.
When the onions come out of the oven, top your spinach with some roasted potatoes, grilled onions, strawberries, avocado, grilled chicken and goat cheese. Drizzle with the warm reduction (also yummy at room temperature) and serve!