Pear and Goat Cheese Salad

A fairly light salad with a big personality, this salad has style grace and goat cheese. I love me some goat cheese. Other cheese go just as well, a little sliced brie, crumbled blue or feta. Don’t feel limited to walnuts either; you can use hazelnuts (filberts), almonds, pecans or even macadamia nuts. Each one has its own personality and changes the salad ever so slightly.  GO ahead experiment (no ones watching, I swear!).

Ingredients:

1 Fresh pear not too ripe

1 teaspoon of lemon juice

4 Tablespoons of goat cheese (you can use feta or blue cheese as well) crumbled or fine diced

4 Cups of mixed baby salad greens

4 Tablespoons of chopped walnuts

1 Teaspoon chopped parsley

6 Tablespoons of olive oil (or 5 tablespoons of olive oil and 1 tablespoon walnut oil)

2 Tablespoon red or white wine vinegar

Pinch salt

Fresh cracked black peppercorns

How you do this thing?

Cut the pear in half lengthwise, remove core. Cut into ¼ inch thick lengthwise slices. Place in a plastic bowl or storage container toss with the lemon juice to coat (this will stop the pear from turning brown and nasty looking). Place one cup of salad greens on each of four serving plates; arrange the pear slices over the greens in a fan-like pattern. Sprinkle over the cheese and walnuts. In a bowl using a fork or a whisk mix together the olive oil and vinegar with a pinch of salt until well blended. Pour about 2 tablespoons of dressing on each pear/salad green arrangement. If you have a pepper grinder, grind some fresh black pepper over the top of each salad (not too much, don’t go craxy (the “x” is for extreme!) just a little. Serve immediately to four peeps.