A Salad Story

For a long time my philosophy with salad was to throw in everything but the kitchen sink, make some dressing, and ta-da! Salad! These days I am trying to pare down the amount of ingredients and make more simplified, dare I say "elegant" salad. Enter, spiced pecans. They are so simple and if you serve them to guests they will say, "Where on Earth did you buy these." And you can smile and say, "Oh, why I made them." Little does your guest know that you can make these almost a week ahead of time and snack on them all you want.

Though I could have eaten all of them straight from the pan, instead I put them in a salad. Along with sliced pears, blue cheese crumbles, and few thinly sliced shallots. YUM. However this salad could have easily been apples and goat cheese or any other combo of fruit and cheese, or leave out one or the other, go nuts! I'm not here to judge you.

Spiced Pecans

Adapted from Fine Cooking December 2009 and smittenkitchen.com

1 cup pecan pieces or any other nuts

3 tbsp light corn syrup

1 1/2 tbsp light brown sugar

1/2 tsp cumin

1/2 tsp ground coriander

1/2 tsp cayenne pepper

salt

Preheat the oven to 350°. Spray a large baking sheet with vegetable oil. Stir together the corn syrup and the spices. Fold in the nuts. Spread the nut mixture on the baking sheet and bake for 10-15 minutes, until golden brown and sizzling.

For Salad:

1 bunch leafy greens (I used spinach)

3 medium sized bosc pears chopped

1 cup spiced pecans

1/2 cup (or more) blue cheese crumbles

2 thinly sliced shallots (I soaked mine in vinegar to make them soft and hell, I like 'em that way.)

Toss all ingredients together in a bowl with your favorite salad dressing.