I recently made the Stuffed Chicken Roast from Better Home & Garden’s December 2015 issue – I couldn’t help but be inspired by their Harvest Wild Rice Salad, served alongside. Gorgeous greens, wild rice and a citrus dressing caught my eye. Toss in a few apples, pears and toasted pecans and sprinkle on a few dried cranberries or cherries and you have a salad!
Wild Rice Harvest Salad with Citrus Dressing
The original recipe serves 22, so it would be great on a buffet or for a larger dinner party – I cut back on some of the ingredients for our smaller party by a fourth the other night but still managed to make a bounteous wonder. I always wanted to say bounteous, but an opportunity has never really presented itself in conversation, so I can’t really be blamed for saying it now, can I? I’m done… 🙂
I didn’t cut back on the dressing – I made the full amount, thinking I’d like some stashed in the fridge. And I also generally make the full amount or at least extra wild rice – it takes a good amount of time to cook, so I stash it in the freezer in reasonable amounts to use as a side, mix with veggies, or use for a salad or a soup.
Wild Rice Harvest Salad with Citrus Dressing
Some of the pricier ingredients were swapped out and proportions changed up – I like a salad that has mostly “goodies” and less of the less nutrient-dense lettuce. Mixed greens replaced watercress (an ingredient I’ve only seen once in a store in my area!) and pecans replaced pistachios. Pistachios are plentiful and at their lowest pricing (along with most nuts) around Christmas time – buy and stock up your freezer – but frankly, I was just too lazy to open all those shells up.
And I tossed in some dried cranberries. I love a little chewy texture in a salad. In retrospect, I think I couldn’t have gone wrong with a little bacon, instead. I also forgot to add the oranges – oops! So if you’d like to make the recipe as originally stated, check Better Homes & Garden‘s site – but of course, I would think mine is better simply because I customized it to my taste!
This was really a fitting salad to serve alongside the Stuffed Chicken Roast – as a matter of fact, that recipe suggests using some of the port reduction from the roast in the dressing, but unfortunately, there was so little I couldn’t. Next time I’ll make sure to increase, and increase the dried cherries or cranberries so the salad can be sprinkled with those little port infused beauties.
Wild Rice Harvest Salad with Citrus Dressing
Harvest Wild Rice Salad Citrus Dressing
For Rice:
- 1 1/2 cups uncooked wild rice, rinsed and drained
- 4 cups water
- 1 1/2 teaspoons salt
Place rice, water, and salt in a large saucepan. Bring to boiling; reduce heat. Cover and simmer for 45 to 50 minutes or until rice is tender. Drain well and cool. Toss with 1/2 of dressing, reserve the rest for the salad, itself.
Salad:
- 4 navel oranges, peeled, sectioned and cut into 1 inch pieces (about a cup)
- 2 stalks celery, cut on the bias, 1/4″
- 4 red apples, cored and sliced thinly
- 4 pears, cored and sliced thinly; Bosc work well as they hold up better than some of the softer pears
- 1 cup coarsely chopped pistachios (I used pecans)
- 1 cups watercress (I used mixed greens)
- 1 cup dried cherries or cranberries
Toss ingredients in a large bowl with wild rice. Add additional dressing and toss. Serve.
Dressing:
- 1/4 cup cider vinegar
- 2 tablespoons finely chopped shallot (I replace with thinly sliced green onion)
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon black pepper
- 3 tablespoons of cherry port reduction from Stuffed Chicken Roast *
- 1 tablespoon Dijon-style mustard
- 1 teaspoon finely grated orange zest
- 3 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice
- 1/4 cup olive oil
* The cherry port cooking liquid can be replaced by 2 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice and 1 tablespoon honey
Place vinegar, shallot (or green onion), salt and pepper in a jar and allow to sit for 10 minutes. Add cherry liquid or substitute, mustard, zest and juice. Shake to combine. Add oil and shake.
From the kitchen of http://www.frugalhausfrau.com, adapted from Better Homes & Gardents
Make more Wild Rice or any Long Cooking Grain and portion and freeze!
Takes a long time to cook, cook & portion
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I will be bringing this Harvest Wild Rice Salad Citrus Dressing to Throwback Thursday, No. 17, where I’m honored to be a co-host as well as to Fiesta Friday number 98, with two brand-new co-hosts, Sadhna @ Herbs, Spices, and Traditions and Natalie @ Kitchen, uncorked. Make sure to stop by and check out all the posts, and if you blog, please do contribute one of your own! See you there!
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