This light and citrus-y butter lettuce salad combines sweet orange, tart grapefruit, creamy avocado and the crunch of pistachios to make a palate pleasing winner!
Butter Lettuce Salad with Citrus Shallot Vinaigrette
Serves 4
What you’ll need:
For the dressing:
1 shallot, finely minced
1 clove garlic, crushed
1/4 cup canola and olive oil, mixed
1/3 cup seasoned rice vinegar
1 teaspoon orange zest
1 teaspoon lemon juice
1 Tablespoon finely chopped fresh Tarragon
Salt and freshly ground pepper to taste
For the Salad:
1 large or 2 small heads butter lettuce
Fresh ruby red grapefruit sections, white pith removed
Fresh orange sections, white pith removed
1 to 2 ripe avocados, sliced
Green onion, thinly sliced
Toasted hazelnuts or pistachios, coarsely chopped
Steps:
For dressing:
- Mix all ingredients together in a shaker jar. Season to taste with salt and pepper. Adjust ingredients to taste.
- Let the mixture set for at least one hour. Refrigerate if not using immediately, but bring to room temperature to serve.
To serve the salad:
- Wash your greens and spin or dry lettuce leaves so that there is no water on them. Refrigerate lettuce until crisp. When ready to serve, place into a large salad bowl.
- Pour desired amount of dressing over the lettuce to coat the leaves and place onto individual salad plates. Do not saturate salad with dressing; you just want it to “glisten”.
- To each plate, add a few orange and grapefruit sections and then decoratively place 2 to 3 avocado slices per plate. Sprinkle with green onion slices. Top with toasted hazelnuts or pistachios that have been coarsely chopped.
A grind or two of freshly grated black pepper, a drizzle more of dressing and Voila!
