Harvest Apple Salad – Mel’s Kitchen Cafe

This harvest apple salad is loaded with so many scrumptious components, like crisp apples, child greens, feta, bacon, pecans, and extra.

Tossed with a honeyed apple cider French dressing, the mix is among the tastiest salads ever! You’ve received crunch. You’ve received the tastiest French dressing. You’ve received the proper fall salad!

The fantastic thing about this salad is that the components are simply customizable! Swap the salad components out and in relying in your style preferences. I’ve included numerous ideas for the place to supply components and make-ahead choices beneath! ⬇️

I’m all the time in search of extra-yummy salads which can be showstoppers for entertaining…but in addition easy and scrumptious sufficient to serve only for my little household. This harvest apple salad positively matches the invoice for the entire above!

Harvest Apple Salad Elements

• Child Greens: Like child spring greens, child arugula, child kale, child spinach, or a mix!
• Chopped Apples: Use a crispy, candy, tangy selection, like Honey Crisp or Cosmic Crisp.
• Candy Spicy Candied Pecans: Retailer purchased or selfmade candied pecans work nice on this salad. In case you can’t discover (or don’t have time for) candied pecans, toasted pecans or one other kind of nut can work. See the word within the recipe for my go-to selfmade recipe and the way I adapt it for this salad.
• Dried Cranberries: Craisins or dried cherries work nice. If in season, pomegranate arils will make an amazing substitution.
• Pumpkin Seeds: Search for these within the snack/nut aisle of the grocery retailer. In case you can’t discover them, shelled, evenly salted sunflower seeds are a very good substitution.
• Bacon: Prepare dinner and crumble about 6 strips of bacon for this salad (clearly, nobody will hearth you if you happen to use greater than that). 😉
• Feta: In case you are seeking to take this salad (and feta) up a notch, purchase a block of feta cheese (fairly broadly obtainable; often by the specialty cheeses) and crumble it your self – it’s so a lot creamier than already crumbled feta. 
• Pink Onions: Thinly sliced!

Swap components out and in and tailor them to your style preferences. Additionally, be happy so as to add roughly of any ingredient!

Apple Cider French dressing

The dressing for this salad is tangy, evenly candy, and so yummy. Hold this recipe in your again pocket, as a result of It makes an amazing dressing for different salads apart from simply this one!

In a blender, mix olive oil, apple cider vinegar, honey, Dijon mustard, garlic, and salt and pepper and course of till clean.

That’s it! Really easy, and so yummy.

Make-Forward Suggestions

This salad requires a little bit of chopping and prep, nonetheless, many elements of this salad might be prepped forward of time so the meeting and serving is fast and simple.

1. French dressing: Make this as much as per week forward of time and retailer within the fridge. Give it a very good stir to recombine, if wanted, earlier than serving.
2. Pink Onions: Thinly slice the purple onions as much as a day prematurely. Moreover, to take the pungent chunk out of the onions, retailer or soak them in ice water for a number of hours earlier than serving. Drain and pat dry.
3. Candied Pecans: If making these your self, they are often made a number of days prematurely and saved at room temperature in an hermetic container.
4. Bacon: The bacon might be cooked, crumbled, drained on paper towels, after which saved within the fridge for as much as per week. Take the bacon out to return to room temperature earlier than serving within the salad.

Make it a Predominant Dish

This loaded salad is filled with crunch (a lot crunch!). The feel and flavors are unimaginable. Whereas it makes a beautiful facet dish, it might probably simply transition to major dish territory, by serving it with cooked, chopped hen.

Listed here are a couple of favourite hen recipes/concepts that might pair deliciously with this harvest apple salad:

I can’t wait so that you can do this salad! It’s an epic mixture of components so tasty on their very own, you recognize the tossed salad goes to be a slam dunk hit. It’s as scrumptious as it’s stunning (and as we each know, that doesn’t all the time occur with fairly meals!).

Harvest Apple Salad

Yield: 6 to eight servings

Prep Time: 30 minutes minutes

Prepare dinner Time: 10 minutes minutes

Whole Time: 40 minutes minutes

Apple Cider French dressing:

• ½ cup olive oil
• ¼ cup apple cider vinegar
• 1 to 2 tablespoons honey
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1 clove garlic, finely minced
• ¼ teaspoon coarse, kosher salt (use half for desk salt)
• Pinch black pepper

Salad:

• 6 cups child spring greens, child arugula, child kale or a mix
• 1 cup chopped honeycrisp or cosmic crisp apples (about 1 medium apple)
• ¾ cup candy spicy candied pecans (see word for the recipe I take advantage of and retailer purchased choices)
• ½ cup dried cranberries (i.e. craisins)
• ½ cup evenly salted, roasted pumpkin seeds (see word)
• ½ cup cooked and crumbled bacon (about 6 strips)
• ½ cup crumbled feta cheese (see word)
• ¼ cup thinly sliced purple onions

Prepare dinner ModeStop your display screen from going darkish

• For the French dressing, mix all of the components in a blender and course of till clean. Refrigerate till able to serve. The French dressing might be made a number of days forward of time.

• For the salad, mix all of the salad components in a big bowl and toss evenly.

• Give the dressing a stir to recombine, if wanted. Serve the dressing on the facet or toss the salad with the dressing and serve.

Candied Pecans: my favourite, straightforward recipe for selfmade candied pecans is that this one. When making them for this salad, I often halve the recipe, use chopped pecans as an alternative of complete, cut back the cinnamon to three/4 teaspoon, and add 1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper (add extra, to style). For retailer purchased, look within the snacks/nuts aisle of the grocery retailer. (Dealer Joe’s has candy and spicy complete candied pecans that may simply be chopped for this salad.) In case you can’t discover/don’t have time for candied pecans, toasted pecans or one other kind of favourite nut can work. 
Pumpkin Seeds: I’ve seen these in a number of grocery shops within the snacks/nuts aisle. In case you can’t discover them, shelled, evenly salted sunflower seeds are a very good substitution.
Feta Cheese: in case you are seeking to take this salad (and feta) up a notch, purchase a block of feta cheese (fairly broadly obtainable; often by the specialty cheeses) and crumble it your self – it’s so a lot creamier than already crumbled feta. 
Apple: the chopped apples might be tossed in 1 to 2 teaspoons recent lemon juice to maintain from turning brown, if desired.
 

Course: Salad, Facet Dish

Delicacies: American

Methodology: No-Bake

Serving: 1 serving (1 1/4 cups salad), Energy: 251kcal, Carbohydrates: 14g, Protein: 5g, Fats: 21g, Saturated Fats: 4g, Ldl cholesterol: 13mg, Sodium: 172mg, Fiber: 2g, Sugar: 10g