Radicchio Salad with Blue Cheese, Honeyed Walnuts and Cabernet
I created this dish some time back while browsing round the fridge. (To be honest, I was giving the fridge its weekly clean and got hungry!)
I looked in the crisper drawer and found a couple radicchio lettuce heads and asked myself what I could do with them.
I moved to the cheese drawer and found a little piece of neglected blue cheese; it had been over-looked for the last few cheeseboards due to being so small, but this meant it had aged nicely. Hmm… blue cheese and radicchio.
Better get something a little sweet to balance it out. From the pantry, I got a handful of walnuts, tossed them in a pan with some honey, and cooked them until golden.
Now we are getting somewhere.
But, although coated in honey, the walnuts would still have a slight bitterness. Back to the fridge. There I found some Cabernet grapes; I de-seeded them and added them to the plan. I thought that maybe the whole dish was getting a little too sweet now, so decided to throw in a few sprigs of peppery watercress to bring back the balance.
Although not sure what it would taste like, I was pretty certain that the flavors would work relatively well together. I tossed it all in a large mixing bowl, whipped up a dressing, and served it up for lunch – so much for cleaning the fridge.
Enjoy this gorgeous radicchio salad by Chef Paul Hegeman.
Radicchio Salad with Blue Cheese, Honeyed Walnuts and Cabernet
Ingredients
- 1 head radicchio lettuce
- 25 sprigs watercress
- 1/2 cup walnuts
- 2 tablespoons honey
- 3 ½ oz blue cheese
- 20 black Cabernet grapes
- 2 teaspoons Dijon mustard
- 1 cup balsamic vinegar
- olive oil extra virgin
- sea salt flakes
- black pepper freshly ground
Instructions
- In a small saucepan, reduce the balsamic over a medium heat until reduced by two thirds. Allow to cool. (You could do a larger quantity, as reduced balsamic is always nice to have on hand.)
- Remove the outer leaves of the radicchio until you get to the deep red centre of the head.
- Break up the red heart and tear it into uniform bite size pieces. Remove the white spines by cutting a V in each leaf.
- Toss the walnuts with the honey, place them in a non stick pan, and cook over a high heat, tossing all the time or they will burn.
- Once golden, remove them from the pan and spread out on baking paper and allow to cool.
- In a small bowl, mix the mustard with a good splash of olive oil, season with a little salt and pepper, and whisk until combined.
- Place the lettuce, watercress and grape halves in a large mixing bowl and toss with a few tablespoons of the dressing.
- Arrange evenly on 4 plates and garnish with crumbled cheese, walnuts and a drizzle of the reduced balsamic.
Notes
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