Category: Vegetables, Recipes | Post by: Andrea Wong
I remember the first time that I had a pear and blue cheese salad. It was in Melbourne, many haircuts ago and I remember being blown away by the combination. The freshness and crunch of pear, teamed with the strong flavour of blue cheese, topped off with a few sweet crunchy toffeed walnuts - d'lish!
It is an easy salad to prepare and it's perfect for when pears are in season. I used the pears that I bought from the market, called Stark Crimson. These are the same kind of pears that I bought recently and wrote about.
Use firm pears, you want the pear to have a bit of crunch to it. It is delicious with a honey mustard or raspberry vinaigrette.
You can easily whip this salad up as a starter, for your loved one this Valentine's Day - it will be sure to impress.
Pear and blue cheese salad with toffeed walnuts and honey mustard vinaigrette
Serves 2
Ingredients
1 pear, sliced thinly
100g blue cheese
2 cups salad greens
2 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp water
50g walnuts
Directions
- In a small pot, melt the sugar and water over a gentle heat without stirring. Let it bubble and take off the heat when it turns a light honey colour
- Put the walnuts in and quickly coat them with the toffee mixture
- Tip the toffeed walnuts onto a piece of cling film and spread into a single layer. Set aside
- Toss the pears and salad greens together with a few tablespoons of the vinaigrette (recipe below)
- Crumble the blue cheese on top and toss gently
- Garnish with the toffeed walnuts.
Put the leftover viniagrette in a bowl and put it on the table for you to add more, if you like.
Serve as a starter or as part of your main meal.
Honey mustard viniagrette
Ingredients
2 tbsp honey, melted
2 tsp whole grain mustard
2 tbsp white wine vinegar
6 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
salt and pepper, to taste
Directions
- Put all ingredients into a jar and shake!