Tonight was a night for leftovers and cleaning out the fridge. I finished up the last of the tomato sauce from the beginning of the week on pasta. I also had some peaches that needed to be finished off and I though that I would try putting one in a salad. The salad ended up a bit bare as there was not much in the fridge but it tasted good regardless. Sometimes simple is best. I got to try a new salad dressing, a maple balsamic vinaigrette.
I have only recently started making my own salad dressings. It is pretty easy to make your own dressings. The basic components of a dressing are oil and vinegar. There are many types of both oil and vinegar and you can use different combinations of them to make different flavours of dressings. You can also add other ingredients to salad dressings: sweeteners like honey, heat from chilis, herbs, garlic, roasted red peppers, pureed raspberries, etc. There are so many different dressings just waiting to be discovered.
I look forward to further experimentation with salad dressings. Though I will also have to learn how to decide which ingredients go well together in the dressing and which dressing go with which salads.
Peach Salad with Maple Balsamic Vinaigrette
ingredients
- 1 serving salad greens
- 1 peach (sliced)
- 1 tablespoon pecans (chopped)
- 2 teaspoons olive oil
- 2 teaspoons balsamic vinegar
- 1 teaspoon maple syrup
- 1/2 teaspoon dijon mustard
- salt and pepper to taste
directions
- Assemble salad.
- Mix the oil, vinegar, maple syrup, dijon mustard, salt and pepper in a bowl.
- Pour the dressing on the salad.
Shrimp and Blueberry Salad
A great use for all the seasonal ingredients found at the farmers market right now. I think the maple/balsamic vinagrette would compliment the peaches very well. Years ago I lived in Oshawa (a bedroom community of TO) and would go to St. Lawrence Market once in a while.
I like the maple syrup idea. I’ve used honey but never thought of that…with some hot, spicy mustard, yum!
I love peaches in salad. The dressing sounds wonderful.
That sounds like a great dressing. My Dad used to make a dressing with maple syrup and sherry that I’ve been meaning to try again soon. And I have to say, I love fruit in salads but I haven’t made any with peaches in them. Must do that!
I head down to the St. Lawrence Market every Saturday morning. It is an amazing place with a lot of great stuff.
Kevin I did the same thing in 2008. I was tired of frozen food in the microwave and same old same old food. That coming from a woman. Now I cook very upscale cuisine. What a difference. Glad I found you. Lots of fantastic recipes you have. I will be trying many of them. All the best.