This Waldorf Salad is a delicious, simple, fall/winter salad packed with a lot of crunch.
I usually make it with a combination of medium diced fresh apples (pick your favorite… or whatever you have hanging around), diced or sliced celery, walnuts (you can toast if you like), and raisins.
I toss it lightly with a good quality mayonnaise mixed with a squeeze of lemon juice and a bit of sugar.
The result is a very satisfying salad loaded with fiber, vitamins and protein.
This time I went a little overboard and to the finished salad I added a couple of handfuls of Nature’s Garden Omega-3 Deluxe Mix , a blend of dried cranberries, walnuts, pepitas, almonds, pecans, and pistachios, which I bought at Costco last week.
This took the crunchiness and chewiness to the next level!
The tart dried cranberries balanced the sweetness from the raisins and apple, and also provided more chewiness.
The extra nuts, pepitas and pistachios provided even more crunch.
And by binding everything together with the lemony mayo till lightly coated the fruit and nuts remain the stars!
It would also be very easy to make your own custom mix with any or all of those delicious nutritious nuts and dried fruit.
A little history of The Waldorf Salad…
The original Waldorf salad is said to have originated in 1893 at the Waldorf Astoria hotel in New York City.
The salad, originally a mix of apples and celery tossed in a good-quality mayonnaise, was created for the hotel’s debut event, a charity ball in honor of St.Mary’s Hospital for children on March 14, 1893.
Oscar Tschirky, the Waldorf’s maitre d’hotel at the time is credited with creating the salad.
Through his 50 years at the hotel, Mr. Tschirky, a Swiss immigrant, who was a busboy at the Hoffman House, then a waiter at Delmonico’s before landing the job at the Waldorf, became a celebrity, just slightly less famous than the people he waited on.
The Waldorf Salad, with many variations of it, remains very popular, among home cooks and restaurants.
To this day the Waldorf Astoria serves an updated contemporary version of it, made with julienned Granny Smith and Fugi apples, halved red and green grapes, and candied walnuts.
The dressing has evolved from simple mayonnaise to creme fraiche in the 1990′s to an emulsified mixture of Dijon mustard, olive oil, champagne vinegar, egg yolk and white truffle oil.
The simplicity of the original salad has encouraged improvisation, almost since it was introduced.
Check out my version of Chicken Waldorf Salad here.
…and with Thanksgiving around the corner you may want to add a Waldorf Salad to your Thanksgiving dinner, or consider making a Turkey Waldorf Salad after the holiday with the leftovers. It’s all good!
Now on to Thanksgiving…