This is an amazingly delicious blue cheese salad.
If you love blue cheese, this is bound to become one of your favorite lunch recipes.
It is also perfect to serve as a side salad with a main meal. I love the mix of fruit, tangy cheese, the crunch of nuts and the chewy dried cranberries. You’ll love this one.
This recipe is so elegant, it’s great for entertaining. It makes a perfect lunch salad or use it as a side salad with beef, chicken or fish.
This is quite a healthy salad recipe. Of course there’s the heavy cream and sour cream, but look at the healthy properties of the other ingredients. Walnuts are extremely healthy for us and the more we eat them the better. Cranberries, apples and spinach are all extremely healthy for us. So relax and enjoy this amazing salad.
Blue Cheese Salad with Spinach, Apples and Walnuts
Ingredients
- 2 apples, large, cored and sliced
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 2 cups baby spinach
- 3 cups endive, curly
- 3 cups escarole, or spring mix
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 3 tablespoons heavy cream
- 3 tablespoons walnut oil
- 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
- 2 tablespoons vinegar, tarragon flavoured
- 1 pinch sugar
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 3 ounces blue cheese, crumbled
- 1/2 cup walnuts, coarsely chopped
- 1/3 cup cranberries, dried
Instructions
- To toast the walnuts preheat the oven to 325°F. Bake the walnuts on a baking sheet for 8 - 10 minutes watching carefully to make sure they don't burn.
- Toss the diced apple with the lemon juice. In a large, deep, wooden bowl, toss the apple, spinach, curly endive and escarole. Cover with a kitchen towel and chill until you are ready to serve it.
- Whisk together the sour cream, heavy cream, walnut oil, mustard, vinegar, sugar and salt. Taste and correct the seasoning. Add salt and pepper to taste if desired. Pour the dressing over the salad mixture and toss gently to combine.
- Top with crumbled cheese, toasted walnuts and the dried cranberries.
Nutrition
Makes 4 large servings or 6 to 8 smaller side servings.
Variations:
- The recipe calls for tarragon flavored vinegar and walnut oil. This makes a fabulous salad dressing but both of those ingredients are expensive. If you are on a bit more of a budget you can do one of two things: Save the recipe for special occasions OR substitute other oil and vinegar combinations. I would suggest an olive oil or grapeseed oil combined with either white wine vinegar or white balsamic vinegar. The taste will be altered somewhat but it will still be absolutely delicious.
- To use it as a full meal, add some slices of grilled chicken breast, as in the image above.
This is a great diabetic recipe. If you are really sensitive to the effect of carbohydrates on your blood sugar, please omit the dried cranberries.
If you love this blue cheese salad, try our cobb salad with blue cheese dressing.
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