This Martha’s Vineyard Salad is one of my go-to salads. This salad is a frequent visitor on our Saturday evening table; it is easy to make with great flavor. I often try a different blue cheese, and that alone changes the flavor of the entire salad. Serve the salad with a self baked bread, or corn bread.
For this salad I used a pre-mixed green salad; they’re easy, not expensive and when it’s, it’s fine; at least I think so. For a household of 2, like ours, I don’t buy 4 of 5 different types of lettuce, because it would mean eating salads almost every day, so every now and then I buy the pre mixes.
Regarding the cheese, you can go so many ways. This time I used Point Reyes Original Blue, a creamy blue cheese that is not overpowering, not stinky (like a Roquefort can be), not too crumbly (like a Blue Stilton can be), and has enough blue flavor to be a good salad blue. For me, the Original Blue is a wonderful cheese when you like to start to learn to appreciate blue cheese.
I know that not everybody likes blue cheese, I hear that over and over again. When you like something, like I like blue cheese, it is sometimes hard to believe that people can say ‘I don’t like blue cheese’, it would be the same to say, that you don’t like cheddar cheese or leafy vegetables. There are so many varieties in each of these categories, that not liking an entire group would be a good enough reason to try again; your taste perception is changing
I can talk forever about blue cheese, and may be I should do that one day. Explaining the differences, the consistency, aromas, flavor, pros and cons, how to keep them etc.
Back to the Martha’s Vineyard Salad. When you bake the onion, don’t bake it to a crisp, just soften it until light brown and allow it to cool until cold or lukewarm, before you add it to the greens.
Mix everything together. Don’t crumble the cheese, but slice it thinly and put it on top of the salad; it gives you little bit of a ‘white canvas’ on which to drizzle some of the dressing, in this case the raspberry vincotto. Vincotta is similar to a balsamic vinegar, but with a sweet raspberry flavor. The fresh raspberries is just a nice addition during summer time.
Martha’s Vineyard Salad
Ingredients
- 1/2 sweet onion
- 2 tablespoons pine nuts
- 3 cups mixed salad greens
- 4 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 tablespoon vinegar or verjus blanc
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup
- 1 teaspoon tarragon
- 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
- salt and pepper
- 2 ounces blue cheese
- 2 teaspoons raspberry vincotto vinegar
- 1/2 cup raspberries optional
Instructions
- Warm oven to 350 degrees.
- Peel onion and slice it into half moon think slices.
- Heat 1 tablespoon of olive oil in a skillet and add the onion. Bake the onion until soft and light brown, don’t bake too long, you don’t want crisp onion. Allow to cool.
- Place pine nuts on a baking sheet and heat in oven until light brown, about 10 minutes. Allow to cool.
- Make the dressing: whisk remaining olive oil, vinegar, maple syrup, tarragon, mustard and salt and pepper.
- Place salad green, onions and pine nuts in a bowl and mix.
- Add dressing and mix again to coat.
- Slice blue cheese in very thin slices. Clean raspberries.
- Divide salad over 2 plates.
- Place blue cheese on salad and add raspberries.
- Drizzle raspberry vincotto on blue cheese and serve.
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