Salad with Goat Cheese & Blueberries

We bought 3 quarts of blueberries this week, and mostly I've been rinsing them off and putting them into a bowl before shovelling them into my mouth. I love blueberries, and could eat them plain all day and all night. However, I thought I ought to make an effort to do something more inspired - or at least more elaborate - with them. Since I had a nice big head of red oak-leaf lettuce and some goat cheese, this is what happened.

4 servings
20 minutes prep time


Dressing:
1/4 cup raspberry or other fruit vinegar
1/4 cup walnut or other nut oil
1 teaspoon honey
1/2 teaspoon black peppercorns, crushed
1/2 teaspoon anise seed, crushed
sea salt to taste

As ever, grind the spices and whisk it all together, or shake it up in a jar.

Salad:
1 small to 1/2 large head of leaf lettuce
1 1/2 cups blueberries
100 grams goat cheese (chevre)
1/3 cup sunflower seeds

Wash the lettuce and dry well. Tear it up into bite-sized pieces. Arrange it on separate serving plates, or in a shallow salad bowl.

Wash the blueberries and dry them well. Scatter them evenly over the lettuce. Crumble the cheese and do likewise. Toast the sunflower seeds until lightly browned in a dry skillet, stirring constantly. As soon as they are done enough, turn them out onto a plate to cool. Sprinkle them over the salad. Give the dressing a shake again, and drizzle it over the salad or salads.





Last year at this time, well, last year at this time I obviously had time on my hands. I made Raspberry-Currant Jam, Blueberry-Currant Jam, Cherry-Currant Jam as well as posting about Making Jam in general. And since one has to eat, even if one has spent the day making jam, I also posted about Pesto Chicken Salad and Green & Wax Beans in Honey-Mustard Dressing.