Mike’s favorite salad

My husband Mike is a true meat-eater. For years he’s been saying that “if it doesn’t have meat it’s not a real meal“. He’s never been into veggies, soups and much less salads. So when he kept insisting that I made this salad over and over again, I thought there must be something to it – and I should probably share it with you!

I love to try new recipes and follow the guidance that other people are giving me, but when it comes to certain foods – particularly salads – I tend to go “off the cuff” and just mix stuff up based on what I’m feeling like. I tend to just open the fridge and see what I’ve got and what speaks to me.

On this day it was the middle of fall and I just wanted to have a “wintery, fall-like” salad. I had some pomegranate seeds in my fridge that I wanted to use up somehow and Mike had just bought some feta cheese at the store because “it spoke to him”. So in my brain these two were a match made in food heaven. So with a few more ingredients I found around the house I somehow made this little concoction and it’s been a winner ever since!

First things first:

Wash and dry your lettuce
Mix up the dressing
Toast your almonds

Ingredients:

2 heads of lettuce – I like to use romaine but you can use cos lettuce or any lettuce you like to eat
250g of pomegranate seeds
200g of feta cheese
1 cup flaked almonds – roasted
Cucumber – about a 10cm chunk or 150g
1 apple – we usually have pink lady but use whatever you like to it. Something that’s relatively sweet and not too tart.

Dressing:

1/2 cup good quality olive oil
1/3 cup balsamic vinegar
1/2 tbsp honey
Squeeze of lemon
Salt and pepper to taste

What to do:

Mix your dressing ingredients until they become uniform (the honey will help bind it all together)

Toast your almonds on a dry pan for about 5min – you should stir frequently so that they all get toasted evenly. You’ll know they’re done when they start to look beautifully golden and you can really smell them

- Cut and wash your lettuce
- Chop your cucumber, apple and feta cheese into small cubes

Note: I don’t like to peel my cucumber or apple but you’re more than welcome to do so if you like!

Mix all your salad ingredients except your almonds – save these for the end

When you’re ready to serve, pour the dressing over the salad, mix until everything is coated and sprinkle your toasted almonds on top

And that’s it! Just a simple salad that takes no time at all to put together but is super satisfying and different to your everyday “lettuce, tomato, cucumber” mixtures. I’ve really enjoyed having it this fall / winter season but you can have it all year round!

Top tips:

If you’re not the biggest fan of balsamic vinegar or feel like it’s too tangy you can swap it for balsamic glaze instead – it’s a much thicker consistency and it’s pretty much like caramelised balsamic vinegar. I don’t think you’d need the bit of honey if you were using the glaze instead.
You can get all the salad ingredients ready, toast your almonds and mix your dressing and just leave it at that until you’re ready to serve. I like to mix it all in a big bowl and then serve directly from there but you could also mix the salad ingredients and then add the dressing and almonds directly onto each plate (this is also a good option if you’re meal prepping and want to have this salad more than one day).
Most of the time we have this as a side salad when having steak or fish but you can also have it just as a main dish! It’s actually fairly filling and this recipe makes a good amount. I’d say as a main it’ll serve 4 people happily but as a side this amount will probably be good for 6-8 people.

I really hope you give it a try and that you enjoy it as much as my husband has! I’d love to hear your thoughts on it and whether you’ve tinkered with it – have you changed anything? Have you found any other ingredients that you think go really well in here? I’d love to hear your thoughts!

As always, thanks for reading and see you on my next post!