If you want to lose weight….eat more vegetables. If you want to live longer, have cleaner skin, and more energy…eat more vegetables. Seriously. Eat all the vegetables! And when you can make them taste amazing like this Meditterranean Steak Salad, all the better.  Bring on the veggies folks!

I got this recipe from the Pampered Chef’s Casual Cooking cookbook.  It has easy recipes for indoors and outdoors.  It’s been a recipe that we’ve made over and over for the last 15 years.  It’s one that our whole family craves and return to it consistently. 

Ingredients for the Salad

• about 6 to 8 artichoke hearts or one can of 14 ounces, cut into quarters
• 2 to 3 tomatoes cut into wedges (or diced as I did because I didn’t read the instructions!)
• one cucumber, cut in half and sliced
• 1/4-1/2 of a red onion, sliced into thin wedges
• 1/2-3/4 cup ripe olives, sliced
• Approximately 4 ounces of crumbled feta cheese
• 1 head of romaine lettuce or ~3 hearts, chopped
• 3/4  cup balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing (see balsamic dressing recipe)

Ingredients for the Steak Marinade

• 2/3 cup balsamic vinaigrette salad dressing
• 4 cloves of garlic minced
• 1 1/2 teaspoons of dried oregano
• 8 teaspoons coarsely ground black pepper
• 1.5- 2 pounds of beef flank steak (of course it is always best to use grass fed organic meat.  Thus, the steak cuts options I had were limited.)

Instructions

1. Marinate steak in Marinade for 6 to 8 hours or more. Honestly I’ve never been prepared this far in advance and usually my marinade only last a couple of hours maybe two tops and it always still tastes good but I imagine if you left it for the 6 to 8 hours or more it would be fabulous.
2. Add salad ingredients with lettuce.
3. Grill steak.  Allow to cool a few minutes prior to cutting and then place on salad.
4. Drizzle with dressing and enjoy!