Waldorf-Esque Salad – Recipe!

So. Fabulous Friday Dinner, aside from being about two hours later than I’d originally planned (yeah…), worked out super well. 🙂 The roast pork (as in: done in the oven, rather than in a slow cooker, but using half a one-cup-jar of rhubarbicue sauce and a scant 2-3 milimetres of sparkling boozy apple cider in the bottom of the roasting pan) was… a little dry, but tasty as all get-out and we have heaps of left-overs for, say, roast pork sandwiches featuring more of said chutney (and/or apple butter) and hot mustard. The salad that I made to go with was… pretty awesome, if I do say so myself. Crunchy and bright, with a really great blend of flavours. As such, I’m recording it here so that I can hunt it up again later on:
 
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Waldorf-Esque Winter Salad
 
INGREDIENTS
 
2 C red cabbage, diced into smaller-than-bite-sized chunks
2″ of leek (light green bit, between “leaf” and “root”), sliced into match sticks
1/4 C walnut crumbles
1/4 C dried cranberries
2 cortland apples, diced
pinch salt
 
1/2 C plain yoghurt
1 tsp each: maple syrup, apple cider vinegar, grainy mustard
1/4 tsp each: nutmeg, black pepper
 
 
DIRECTIONS
 
1) Combine the diced cabbage, sliced leek, crumbled walnuts, and dried cranberries in a large bowl
2) Toss until well-combined
3) Sprinkle the salt over the contents of the bowl
4) Add the diced apples
5) In a small measuring cup or other receptical, blend the yoghurt, maple syrup, vinegar, mustard, nutmeg, and pepper (I just used a fork) until well-mixed
6) Pour the yoghurt mixture over the cabbage mixture
7) Toss/mix until the salad is uniformly coated with the dressing
8) Serve immediately OR allow to sit (covered – I used a plate) in the fridge for 1-24 hours before serving.
9) Enjoy! 😀
 
 
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This salad is delicious, if I do say so myself, and it relies on seasonally available ingredients for the most part – the maple syrup and the apples came from Quebec, the leeks, the cider vinegar, and the yoghurt were from Ontario (though I don’t know where in Ontario, beyond, probably, The GTA), and the cabbage is, well, “Product of Canada” can mean a lot of things, unfortunately, but it’s one of the least value-added products going, so I’m treating it as fairly Okay from the perspective of a loosely defined “local food” diet. The dried cranberries were probably imported. We have a cranberry bog south of town, but I don’t think they’re suppliers for No Name (it’s possible that came from the bogs in Whitby, but it’s just as likely that they came from south of the border in, like, Wisconsin or something) and I’m very sure the walnuts came from California. The spices, likewise, came from father afield.
If you want to turn it into a vegetarian meal, I suggest throwing in half a cup of chilled, pre-cooked grain (barley, kasha, and/or quinoa would all work quite, QUITE nicely here) to the mixture before adding the dressing.
You can use crumbled pecans, chestnuts, heartnuts, or even pumpkin seeds (I suspect) in lieu of the walnuts, if you prefer, and can use mayo (or vegan mayo or maybe soy-ghurt[1]) in lieu of the yoghurt, if you like, too.
 
It’s just as tasty (and loses none of its crunchiness!) on day two, and I’m strongly inclined to whip up a second batch for work lunches over the next couple of days! 😀
 
 
TTFN,
Meliad. 😀
 
 
[1] Soy-ghurt, in my experience, doesn’t have the tart bite of various dairy-based yoghurts, but ymmv. You may want to up the cider vinegar content and/or throw in some nutirional yeast if you want to go this route to make it vegan.