Nothing beats a citrus fruit to twist an endive salad with walnuts and cheese. If you're looking for an easy and affordable starter idea, try our orange and walnut endive salad recipe! With its fruity flavor, this original and vitamin-packed endive salad is a hit with the whole family.
Ingredients
Here are the necessary ingredients for making an endive salad with orange and walnuts for 4 people:
400 g of endives.
1 orange.
60 g of Comté cheese.
1 handful of nuts of your choice.
4 tablespoons of olive oil.
2 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar.
Salt and pepper.
Note: To prepare this endive salad, you can use any nuts you like. You can certainly go for the traditional walnuts from Grenoble, but also cashews, pecans, roasted pistachios, or even peanuts as in some Asian salad recipes.
Cutting of the orange
For this recipe of endive salad with orange and walnuts, I recommend peeling the orange "à vif" to be able to obtain orange segments or large pieces of fruit.
1- Cut the base of the orange so you can place it flat on a dessert plate.
Note: it is preferable to use a dessert plate rather than a cutting board to catch the orange juice.
2- Peeling à vif involves exposing the flesh of citrus fruits before cutting into segments or “suprêmes” or dicing the fruit. To remove the peel all around the fruit, slide the knife blade vertically, close to the flesh.
3- To enhance this unique endive salad, you must collect the fruit flesh on one side and its juice on the other. The orange juice will be used to dilute and flavor the salad dressing.
Endive cutting
In this recipe for endive salad with oranges and walnuts, you need to finely chop the endives.
1- Wash the endives.
2- Cut off their base.
3- Slice the endive leaves into thin strips on a cutting board.
4- Also use a knife and a cutting board to coarsely crush the walnuts. Set aside.
County Cutouts
The bitterness of endive pairs very well with hard cheeses, which add richness and indulgence to winter mixed salads.
For this endive salad recipe with orange and walnuts, I've chosen to use Comté, but feel free to substitute this ingredient with another cheese such as Gruyère or Emmental.
Remove the rind from the Comté and cut it into small cubes. Set aside the cheese cubes until the salad is assembled.
Dressing Preparation
Since the endive salad with orange and walnuts already contains salty, bitter, and sweet ingredients, it is best to **dress it with a very simple vinaigrette**.
1. Pour a pinch of salt and two twists from a pepper mill into a small bowl.
2. Add balsamic vinegar and olive oil.
3. Mix well, ideally using a small whisk so that your dressing is well emulsified.
Endive salad assembly
Once you have chopped all the ingredients and prepared the dressing, all that's left to do is assemble these different elements to make the endive salad with oranges and walnuts.
1- Place the sliced endives in a salad bowl.
2- Add the diced comté cheese and orange segments.
3- Pour in the orange juice and mix well.
At this point in the recipe, you can refrigerate the endive salad until it's time to serve.
4- Just before serving, season the salad with the dressing and sprinkle with crushed walnuts.
Note: by doing so, the endives will not "cook" in contact with the dressing, and the walnuts will retain all their crunchiness.