Crisp Goat Cheese Salad

I love cheese. Melted. Fried. Baked. Room temperature. Cold. Any and all cheese is good. I even love those frozen fried mozzarella sticks that you bake in the oven and serve with a marina sauce. I've seen pictures of crispy goat cheese salads, and have wanted to try one for ages, but somehow, some other recipe kept moving to the front. Well, while paging through Everyday Food: Great Food Fast, I saw again the recipe for Crisp Goat Cheese Salad . The gorgeous picture suckered me in, that and the promise of warm, melty goat cheese. The time had come.

Oh my, the time should have come a long, long time ago. How have I lived without this wonderfully simple, and elegant salad in my life? Yes, it was elegant. I felt like I was sitting at an outdoor bistro in Paris. I've never actually been to Paris, or a bistro, but this is what I imagine I would eat. It's light, quick, pretty to look at, and tastes good. It makes a perfect light dinner in the summer. The picture in the books shows the goat cheese flattened out, and the instructions tell you to. But my cheese started to crumble and I didn't want it to fall apart, so I left it in it's original log size. I did put it in the freezer for about 30 minutes to make slicing easier.

Crisp Goat Cheese Salad
Serves 4

1/2 cup olive oil, plus more for baking sheet
3 large red potatoes (about 1 pound)
1 tablespoon white-wine vinegar
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
Coarse salt and freshly ground pepper
1 large egg
1 cup fresh breadcrumbs
12 ounces fresh goat cheese (I used 9 because that's what size mine was)
8 ounces mixed salad greens, or mesclun mix


Directions

Preheat broiler. Brush a baking sheet with oil; set side. Place potatoes in a medium saucepan, cover with water, and bring to a boil; simmer until fork tender, about 20 minutes. Rinse under cold water until cool enough to handle. Cut into 1-inch chunks, and place in a medium bowl.

In a large bowl, whisk together vinegar, mustard, and 1/4 teaspoon each, salt and pepper. Slowly add 1/4 cup oil, whisking to emulsify. Pour dressing over potatoes, toss to combine and set aside.

In a shallow bowl, whisk the egg with 1/4 teaspoon each salt and pepper. Place the breadcrumbs in a second shallow bowl. Slice the cheese into 8 rounds, and pat each into a disk about 1/2-inch-thick. Cover with wax paper to prevent sticking. Using two forks, dip disks first in egg, and then in the breadcrumbs, coating evenly. Place on prepared baking sheet. (I just used my hands for this, I think using forks would have been tricky.)

Brush disks lightly with the remaining 1/4 cup oil, and broil until golden and crisp, about 5 minutes. (Mine took only about 3 minutes, before they started getting really brown, next time I will set my broiler on low instead of high.)

Toss the lettuce with the dressed potatoes. To serve, spoon salads onto plates, and top each with cheese disks.

This is my entry for Weekend Herb Blogging. I know. It has no herbs in it. But I chopped a little fresh parsley into the salad. So there. This weeks Weekend Herb Blogging is being hosted by Maninas of Maninas: Food Matters, who, by the way, has the most gorgeous well-behaved mint that I have ever seen!