Chopped Blue Cheese Salad

Name: Chopped Blue Cheese Salad
Prep time: 5 min
Cook time: 5 min
Total time: 10 min
Ingredients: 150 g Mixed lettuce leaves; 30 g Rocket (arugula); 4 Radishes (thinly sliced); 1 stalk Celery (chopped); 1 Apple (sliced); 2 portion Honey mustard dressing; 100 g Blue cheese (crumbled); 2 tbsp Pecans (crushed); 3 rasher Bacon (cooked and chopped)

Diet: Vegetarian

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This Chopped Blue Cheese Salad is a simple, but flavour packed salad that is impressive enough to serve up to guests. An incredible mixture of texture, with crunch and creaminess, it takes less than 10 minutes to make.

A bowl of salad leaves topped with cheese and bacon.

We are big fans of salads. Whoever thinks salads are boring, has clearly been making them wrong! There is so much that you can do with a salad, and they have a little bit of everything, but this blue cheese salad is definitely one of our favourites. A great way to use creamy and flavourful blue cheese, this is a favourite for a Christmas Day starter too.

Salads are perfect for when you want to use up lots of little bits of different ingredients and you don't have a lot of time. You only need to cook the bacon in this recipe, and everything else is just thrown together. A quick and easy lunch and a serious crowd pleaser.

Looking for other ways to use blue cheese? Why not try our Broccoli and Stilton Soup, Easy Mushroom Tartlets or our amazing Grazing Platter.

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Why you will love it
Ingredients needed
Step by step
What is Stilton?
Variations
What to serve with a Blue Cheese Salad
Frequently Asked Questions
Extra tips
More salad recipes
Recipe
Feedback

Why you will love it

A delicious salad - Salads don't have to be boring, and this might be as exciting as they get. A mix of salty and sweet, and creamy and crunchy - it has it all.
A new way to eat blue cheese - Not sure what to do with blue cheese apart from serve it on a cheese board? This is a great way to use it.
Use up leftovers - Every special occasion needs a cheese board, and if you have leftovers then this is a good way to use it all up so that nothing goes to waste. Nobody wants to waste cheese!
Adaptable - The great thing about a salad is that it's so easy to adapt. We have given lots of options below on how you can switch and swap ingredients.

Ingredients needed

Lettuce - This is the base of the salad, so you want to make sure that you have a good mixture. We went with some little gem, curly lettuce and radicchio for crunch and then added in some rocket lettuce (arugula) for some peppery flavour. You could use romaine too for crunch or add spinach and kale for a nutrition boost.
Radish - This not only adds some colour, but a strong flavour and added crunch. If you don't like the flavour of radish, you could swap it for diced bell pepper instead.
Apple - We love fruit in salads and apple and blue cheese go so well together. Thinly sliced apples add some sweetness, which balances out the saltiness.
Celery - An easy way to add some extra crunch to the salad. It could be left out if you don't like it.
Bacon - Blue cheese and bacon is a classic combination. A little chopped bacon on top of the salad goes a long way. You could add cooked chorizo if you wanted something a little more fancy.
Blue cheese - The star of the salad. We used Stilton, but other blue cheese would work well in this recipe too. You could swap Stilton for Danish blue cheese, dolcelatte, Roquefort, cambozola or Gorgonzola.
Dressing - We used our Honey and Mustard Dressing, as it would perfectly with the blue cheese and bacon.
Pecans - This adds a lovely crunch on top of the salad, and cheese and nut always go so well together. You could use walnuts or flaked almonds instead, or maybe a mixture of nuts.

A full ingredients list with measurements is in the recipe card below.

Step by step

One: Cook the bacon to your liking. In a large bowl add the lettuce leaves, sliced radish and chopped celery.

Two shot collage of lettuce leaves in a bowl then sliced radish and celery added.

Two: Add the sliced apple and pour over the dressing.

Two shot collage of sliced apples added and then the dressing poured over.

Three: Mix well and add the chopped bacon and crumbled cheese.

Two shot collage of the salad mixed then the bacon and cheese added.

Four: Transfer to bowls and top with the crushed pecans.

The salad transfered to a serving bowl and topped with crushed pecans.

What is Stilton?

If you haven't tried Stilton before, or you aren't really sure what it is, then read on! Stilton is a strong blue cheese made in the UK since the 18th Century. It's a crumbly, almost soft, cheese, that has a marble effect of blue veins running through it.

Although the village of Stilton is in Cambridgeshire, a cheese can only be called Stilton if it has been made in one of the three permitted counties of Leicestershire, Derbyshire or Nottinghamshire. There is a blue cheese made in the village of Stilton, but they have to call it Bells Blue because of EU regulations.

Stilton has such a strong smell and flavour, which puts a lot of people off, but we think that is part of the appeal. When it comes to cheese, it's the smellier the better for us! Because Stilton has such a strong flavour, you don't need to use a lot of it because it will overpower the dish. A little goes a long way in this dish.

Chopped bacon and crumbled blue cheese on top of salad leaves.

Variations

Vegetables - There is so much that you can add to a salad. Some of our favourite extras to add to this salad are cucumber, tomatoes, roasted peppers, artichokes, sun-dried tomatoes, broccoli, avocado and grated carrot.

Meat - We added some bacon for salty flavour and crunch. However, you could add some leftover shredded chicken, or even some slices of steak if you wanted to make it really fancy.

Grains - If you wanted to make this more of a filling salad, then there are some grains that you could add to it to bulk it out. You could add pasta, quinoa, rice, orzo or bulgar wheat. Or why not bulk it out with some chickpeas or butter beans?

Dressing - The sweetness of the honey and the strong flavour of the mustard really work in the dressing we have used. However, a balsamic dressing would work too, or something lighter like a Lemon Vinaigrette.

What to serve with a Blue Cheese Salad

We usually serve up small portions of this as a starter to the main dish. However, if we are having it as a main then we would either add some Sourdough Croutons, or serve it with a slice of White Bread or Easy Bagels.

This blue cheese salad also makes a great side dish. Why not try it alongside one of these recipes:

A spoon lifting out some salad from a bowl.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is a blue cheese salad healthy?

I think that salads are always a good opportunity to get lots of extra vegetables in your diet. However, that doesn't automatically mean they are healthy and it is easy to load them with calories with cheese and dressings. So, if that is something you want to keep on the lower side, then be mindful for that. This is a fairly high calorie salad with the blue cheese and bacon.

How to store blue cheese salad

This salad is best eaten fresh, however if you have some leftovers then you can store it in an air tight container in the fridge for 24 hours. Try to dress it just before you are serving it though, otherwise the salad can go soggy.

Is this blue cheese salad gluten free?

Yes, as long as you make sure the bacon you are using is gluten free (some isn't surprisingly) and there is no cross contamination, then this is a gluten free salad.

Extra tips

• You can swap the Stilton for Danish blue cheese, dolcelatte, Roquefort, cambozola or Gorgonzola.
• Make this salad meat free by leaving out the bacon.
• If you think you are going to have leftovers, only dress individual portions of the salad, rather than the whole thing. As storing the salad with the dressing tends to make it very soggy.
• If you are not a fan of blue cheese, then you could use feta instead.
• Why not try toasting the pecans to bring out their flavour.
• If you have big chunks of stilton, most will sink to the bottom. However, if you crumble it more, it will mix more evenly.

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If you’ve tried this Blue Cheese Salad recipe, let us know how you got on in the comments below.
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