• Butter Lettuce Salad with Stilton,
    Roasted Pears, and Walnuts

    November 19, 2008

    Posted in: The Recipes

    You are probably accessing this through a link which promised gorgonzola dolce, but the irrefutable fact remains that Stilton is absolutely the finest cheese for this particular salad. Depending on availability where you are, please know that Fourme d’Ambert, a crumbly but creamy blue, is also a splendid option (a French one, to boot!), as is the aforementioned gorgonzola dolce. “Dolce” means sweet in Italian, and the aptly titled cheese is exceptionally creamy and delicious, redolent of all the blue-veined moldy goodness without the bite. Just know that it’s exceedingly high fat content mkes it impossible to crumble, so it’s rather awkwardly slippery to work with.

    Ingredients, for 1 (makes a meal):

    • 1/2 head of Butter/Boston lettuce
    • 1 Anjou or Comice pear, ripe but not mushy.
    • 1 oz Stilton
    • 10 Walnuts
    • 1 T Dijon mustard.
    • 1 T champagne vinegar, or white wine vinegar
    • 2 T walnut oil
    • Salt, Pepper

    Procedure:

    1. Wash the lettuce and tear into bite size chunks.
    2. Wash the pear and halve it, use a melon baller to scoop out its seeds, and roast, face up, for 15 minutes in a 375 degree oven while you execute the rest of the preparations.
    3. Mix mustard, vinegar, salt, and pepper in little bowl. Stir to dissolve the salt, and let sit for a few minutes before adding the walnut oil. This is the correct method for making a vinaigrette: Once the oil is added, the salt will be unable to dissolve, and you will end up needing to over-salt the dressing to compensate. Additionally, the emulsifying agent, should there be one, (in this case la moutarde) is always added to the vinegar.
    4. Crumble the walnuts and reserve.
    5. Crumble the blue cheese and reserve.
    6. Toss the lettuce in the dressing.
    7. Distribute the cheese over the salad.
    8. Remove the pears from over and dice into large, toothesome chunks.
    9. Add to the salad immediately, garnish with the walnuts, and toss gently. The heat of the pears should melt the cheese into a luscious secondary dressing.

    Variation: If you find a perfectly ripe pear, the sort that begs to be eaten out of hand, round with juice, slice it into the salad raw. This tiny alteration also lightens the mood of the dish enough to transition it from dinner to lunch fare, and is better suited to fall crispness than deep winter, when the warmth of the roasted pears is much appreciated.

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