This Grilled Peach & Blueberry Salad is the perfect summer salad to have on your table before peach season ends! Grilling the peaches intensifies their natural sugars, giving them a delicious caramelized taste.
Toss in some spiced pecans for a contrast in flavor and some blueberries for an explosion of color! Then add a sweet and spicy homemade balsamic vinaigrette to delight the palate and create the perfect fusion for all your assorted ingredients!
A scattering of microgreens and edible flowers at the end helps bring the salad to a nutritious and beautiful finish. Your guests will leave your table dreaming and talking about your showstopper for days!
My Personal Twist On Salads
Leafy green salads are traditionally not a part of Pakistani cuisine. Our palate is accustomed to richly spiced curries, heavily laden with meat and vegetables. However, I personally love salads and have always felt that there's so much room for creativity when it comes to preparing them.
In order to entice my family, especially my husband, to jump on the salad bandwagon with me I started dabbling with some creative recipes for salads. You'll find that most of my salads on the blog have some hint of spice in them. To coin a popular Southern phrase I love, "This ain't yo' mama's salad"!
Nevertheless, I have tried to stay close to the root of what a salad is and should be by applying a basic principle outlined in foodbusinessnews.net
One of the ways to approach new flavors is to combine the familiar with a twist
The Grilled Peach & Blueberry Salad Recipe
The leafy greens in a salad are usually the least popular part of a salad for most people. To counter that I usually layer mine with delicious seasonal fruits and vegetables. These add the much needed texture and flavor that takes a salad from blah to sensational!
Grilling The Peaches
When making this particular salad, I chose to further enhance the flavor by grilling the peaches. It took very little time and was done on a grill pan on my stove.
After grilling the peaches, I let them sit a while as I prep the nuts and dressing. This allows them to soften a bit more and release some natural juices. The juice can then be mixed in with the dressing so the salad is truly infused with that peach taste.
One or two things to remember are to definitely use some form of fat, or if you're watching calories like I do, nonstick spray. You should ideally leave the peaches on one side for 2-3 minutes before flipping them over in order to get the required grill marks. The fat will prevent them from sticking to the grill pan during this time, as they release their sugars.
The Dressing
If you've made any of my other salads you'll note that I add my own homemade dressings. Whether it's a simple squeeze of lemon juice, some infused oil and balsamic vinegar, or something more complex, you will find that the salad tastes much more refreshing than if you were to use a store bought dressing.
In most of my salads, I try to add some of the bold flavor we're accustomed to in Pakistani cuisine via my dressings. This is where infused oils and vinegars are a huge flavor enhancer. Easily available through many retailers, at times I don't even feel the need to add more than a combination of the two to make a quick dressing.
In this salad, however, I decided to become a bit more adventurous and add a little more spice in the way of crushed serrano chilies. The sweet taste of the honey, balsamic vinegars and fruit balances this well. You're left with a hint of that bold flavor, yet it doesn't overpower the palate.
The Spiced Pecans
Preparing your own spiced nuts in the oven or air fryer adds yet another element of not just flavor, but texture. I always like a little crunch in my salad and nuts are my usual add in for that. Trying to carry that bold flavor a little further, I made my own spiced nuts in my air fryer.
Similar to traditional glazed nuts, these have added spice in the form of paprika. Just like the dressing, the sweet combined with the spicy keeps us close to what a traditional salad topping would taste like, but with a little added kick!
Don't have an air fryer? Make them in the oven instead! Any leftover nuts make a great snack!
Go try this salad while peaches are still in season! It's a perfect and easy side to make for that labor day barbecue! Don't forget to drop a comment and rating to let me know what you think of the recipe!
Other Salads To Try From The Blog
- pear-date-goat-cheese-salad
- watermelon-salad-with-goat-cheese
- spicy-mexican-corn-salad
- spicy-mango-salad
- kachumber-salad-recipe
- corn-masala-chaat
- thai-salad
Grilled Peach & Blueberry Salad
Ingredients
Air Fryer Spiced Pecans
- 1 cup pecan halves
- ¼ cup extra virgin olive oil
- ¼ tsp salt
- 1 tbsp confectioners sugar
- 1 tsp paprika
- ½ cup dark brown sugar
Sweet & Spicy Honey Balsamic Vinaigrette
- 1 serrano chili pepper
- 1 lemon
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp black pepper
- 1 tbsp mustard
- ¼ cup honey
- 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 2 tbsp meyer lemon infused olive oil SEE NOTES
- 2 tbsp pomegranate balsamic vinegar SEE NOTES
- 2 tbsp persian lime balsamic vinegar SEE NOTES
Grilled Peach & Blueberry Salad
- 4 cups baby spinach & arugula mix
- 1 cup blueberries
- 2 peaches
- Nonstick Spray
- ½ cup microgreens OPTIONAL
- 2 edible flowers OPTIONAL
- 1 cup air fryer spiced pecans
- ½ cup sweet & spicy honey balsamic vinaigrette
Instructions
Air Fryer Spiced Pecans
- Measure 1 cup Pecan halves into a mixing bowl
- Add in the olive oil, salt, paprika, confectioners sugar and brown sugar and toss well
- Line your air fryer basket with some foil and spread the mixture on it
- Cook @ 300° for 5 minutes to roast the pecans and have the sugar melt (SEE NOTES FOR OVEN METHOD)
- Take out of the air fryer and set aside to cool before using.
Sweet & Spicy Honey Balsamic Vinaigrette
- Roughly chop the serrano chili and mash using a mortar and pestle or grind using a food processor
- Squeeze the juice of the lemon and mix with the crushed chili
- Add to a mixing bowl and mix in with all the other ingredients and whisk well
- Use as much as desired and store any remaining dressing in the fridge for later use.
Grilled Peach & Blueberry Salad
- Heat a grill pan and spray with the non stick spray
- Slice the peaches and grill for 2-3 minutes on each side till you get the desired sear marks and then set them aside
- Measure the greens into a bowl
- Add the blueberries and toss with the dressing (SEE NOTES)
- Sprinkle with the nuts and toss lightly to distribute.
- Gently scatter the peaches and drizzle any juice on the salad to give it extra flavor.
- Garnish with the microgreens and flower petals and enjoy!
Notes
- 2 Tbsps olive oil mixed with 1 tsp lemon juice
- 1 Tbsp dark balsamic vinegar mixed with 1 tsp pomegranate juice
- 1 Tbsp white balsamic vinegar mixed with 1 tsp lime juice
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