Chicory, walnut, pear and roquefort salad

Recipes

chicory, roquefort and apple salad — Chicory, walnut, pear and roquefort salad
This salad is simple but incredibly delicious

Serves4

Preparation10 Mins

Cooking Time10 Mins

This salad is simple, but it’s a firm favourite and one we teach at the Raymond Blanc Cookery School. As a Frenchman, I naturally regard Roquefort as the king of the blue cheeses, but there are many wonderful British blue cheeses as well, such as Stilton, Cashel Blue, Blue Vinney, Yorkshire Blue and Barkham Blue. Any of those would make a delicious substitute in this dish. I would advise you to use an unsweetened pear such as Conference, which is the pear best suited for cheese. Interestingly enough, it is a French heritage variety of 1884 from Leon Leclerc de Laval … sorry!

Ingredients Required

For the Roquefort dressing

50g: Roquefort cheese, room temperature

20g: Water, tepid

15ml / 1 tbsp: White wine vinegar

30ml / 2 tbsp: Olive oil, extra virgin

1 pinch: Pepper, black, freshly ground

For the salad

800g / 4: Chicory, white and purple, small, washed and, quartered lengthways

100g: Walnuts, roughly chopped

250g / 1 medium: Conference Pear, ripe but firm, cored, halved, finely sliced

60g / 1 stick: Celery, finely sliced

80g: Roquefort, cold and crumbled

10g / 2 tsp: Chives, finely chopped

Cooking Method

Step 1

For the Roquefort dressing

In a large bowl, using a spatula, cream the Roquefort cheese to a smooth paste, add the warm water, white wine vinegar and whisk until smooth. Gradually whisk in the olive oil little by little; season to taste with the freshly ground black pepper. No salt is needed, as the Roquefort has plenty itself.

Step 2

For the salad

In a large bowl, toss the chicory, walnut, pear, celery and two-thirds of the cold Roquefort into the dressing and arrange on a large serving plate. To finish, crumble the remaining cold Roquefort over the salad and sprinkle with chopped chives.

Step 3

Variations

Should you wish, you can replace chicory with any other autumn or winter salad leaves such as lambs lettuce, frisee and escarole, which are best suited to this dish; these leaves are hardy and can take cold weather. The Conference pear can be replaced by apples, muscadet grape raisins, dates or figs etc. My beloved Roquefort could be replaced by any of the beautiful British blue cheeses. My favourite would be Barkham Blue.

Chef tips

"I would advise you to use an unsweetened pear such as Conference, which is the pear best suited for cheese. Interestingly enough, it is a French heritage variety of 1884 from Leon Leclerc de Laval … sorry!"

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Chicory, walnut, pear and roquefort salad

Ingredients Required

For the Roquefort dressing

For the salad

Cooking Method

Step 1

Step 2

Step 3

Chef tips

Voila!

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