Many of the most successful salads are a mix of sweet (in the form of fruit) interspersed with a twang of salty cheese. Feta is brilliant with peaches; or with watermelon. Peaches also are brilliant with blue cheese. Apples go well with blue cheese too. Nuts are often a great addition with walnuts (or, harking back to a Canadian upbringing, pecans) going especially well with blue cheese. There is also, for example, grilled goat cheese with figs and pecans…. and so on, and so forth.

In the spirit of all this I hit upon the idea of marrying goat cheese (ungrilled as I am bone-idle} with blueberries. I thought I was being immensely original until a friend who lives in the States told me “goat cheese + strawberries + pecans is fairly common”.

Deflated but curious I gave that a go. I wasn’t so convinced by the strawberries. I still think this blueberry version is the best, especially if you are lucky enough to get blueberries with a bit of zing (a lot of the blueberries in supermarkets in the UK are a bit bleh). If you can’t, I recommend adding a few raspberries into the mix. These also give a pop of colour which is very pleasing!

For a post on Riblaire St Varent goat cheese follow this link.

For a post on the difference between pecans and walnuts follow this link.

Blueberries, goat cheese, and walnut salad

Serves four as a light starter, or two with crusty bread for lunch.

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Serves – 4

Ingredients

• 150g blueberries, rinsed and dried…and possibly a few raspberries (see comment above in main text)
• 60g baby salad leaves
• 100g goat’s cheese
• 4 spring onions
• ½ cup walnuts or pecans, dry fried and roughly chopped
• 3 tbsps pomegranate molasses
• 120 ml/½ cup walnut oil
• Salt and pepper

Photos

Instructions

1. Divide the salad leaves between four plates.
2. Cut off the downy rind on either side of the cheese, leave the rind on the outside edge. See photo, above, on left. Crumble it over, slightly peeling the outer rind off as you do so. See photo, above, on right. It doesn’t matter if a bit of rind gets into the salad. Divide between the plates.
3. Share the blueberries (and the raspberries if adding) out between the plates. And do the same with the nuts.
4. Drizzle over the oil and pomegranate molasses, sprinkle over the salt and pepper, and serve.