This could be eaten as a salad, but it would work equally well as a topping for a pork chop, or, grilled or roasted chicken, or a side dish with meat. It would be nice on a salad accompanying a cheese course. If you want to make it more of a “salad” salad, consider adding escarole, watercress, frisée, shreds of Little Gem lettuce or the inner leaves of a butter lettuce to the mix. You could also add microgreens. The cherry syrup used in this is called tart cherry, or sour cherry syrup, and is usually from somewhere like Hungary, Bosnia, Croatia, Poland, etc., and is used for drinks. You can use it in marinades and other things, much as you would pomegranate syrup/molasses. It can be found in specialty shops, better grocery stores, and Corralitos Meats.
INGREDIENTS:
1 bunch arugula, large stems removed, cleaned and dried 2 cups cherries, (crisp, sweet, with good acid, such as Brooks, Bing, Ferrovia, Ranier) pitted and halved ½ cup, heaping, roasted almonds, very coarsely chopped Salt and pepper to taste ½ cup Cherry vinaigrette, or as needed (see recipe)METHOD:
Put arugula into a bowl and drizzle with just enough dressing to coat. Toss gently to spread the dressing. Taste to see if enough dressing has been used and adjust as needed.
Add the cherries and half the almonds to the bowl and gently toss to combine.
Place equal amounts on four plates, being sure to evenly distribute the cherries and nuts from the bottom of the bowl.
Scatter the remaining nuts over the salads and season with a very little salt and some pepper.
The salads are ready to serve.
Chef’s Notes:
If you wish to use this for a garnish or a side, just mix all the ingredients and toss together, saving a few nuts for topping the salads, then place where needed and hit with remaining nuts. Speaking of nuts, pistachios would work well here, and pine nuts also.
To make this more of a “salad”, try using escarole torn into bite-sized bits. Using an equal amount of escarole to arugula is a pretty good ration. You could also add frisée, microgreens, and ribbons of butter lettuce Belgian endive.
Serves: 4
Source: Chef Andrew E Cohen
If you enjoyed this article, please consider sharing it!
