Salad Days: Wilted Baby Spinach with Toasted Pine Nuts and Pomegranate Vinaigrette

In the winter, when root vegetables dominate, I try to make sure that we have salad as an entree at least once a week - there's something so refreshing about fresh greens breaking up the starchy monotony. In this spirit, I'm introducing a new series: salad days. Once a week, through the winter, I'll post a different salad recipe that is hearty and filling enough to serve as a main dish.

The first offering, warm spinach salad with pomegranate and pine nuts, is one I first came across about a year ago. After making it once, I was hooked. I made this salad several times last winter while pomegranates were in season, and I've been waiting all year for them to come back so I could make it again.


I found the recipe in The Armenian Table by Victoria Jenanyan Wise. I've tweaked it slightly. I use pomegranate juice instead of pomegranate molasses; I couldn't find the molasses and I think it would be too sweet for my taste, anyway. I love the sour tang of the juice. Also, Wise's recipe calls for walnuts, and I've made it that way, but once I substituted pine nuts, I could never go back - it just added so much more depth and contrast of flavor.

Wilted Baby Spinach Salad with Toasted Pine Nuts and Pomegranate Vinaigrette
adapted from The Armenian Table: More than 165 Treasured Recipes That Bring Together Ancient Flavors and 21st-Century Style by Victoria Jenanyan Wise

8 cups baby spinach leaves
3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
1/2 cup pine nuts
3 tablespoons pomegranate juice
1 1/2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
seeds from one pomegranate

Rinse and spin dry spinach and place in salad bowl.

Heat the olive oil in a large saute pan over medium heat. Add the pine nuts and cook, stirring frequently, until toasted, 2-3 minutes. When the smell becomes strong and the nuts start to turn golden, they are done. Turn the heat off, add the pomegranate juice and vinegar, and stir to mix. Add hot dressing to spinach and toss. Sprinkle pomegranate seeds on top.

Out of the Box: Final Week of the Summer

Our CSA "summer" share actually lasted well in to October. Here's a shot of our final weekly pickup, which included potatoes, beets, celeriac, leeks, rainbow chard, dinosaur kale, cabbage, carrots, butternut squash, delicata squash, broccoli, and brussels sprouts.

Both the butternut squash and the kale I cooked and then froze for later use. Everything else I used in various dishes that I will post about over the next week or so, except for the celeriac, which I still haven't used! Luckily it's a root vegetable and keeps very well.

Here's the delicata squash after I sliced off the ends and cut it lengthwise, but before I scooped out the seeds. We received delicatas several times over the summer; the first time, I roasted the two squash halves with some water in the pan, and the result was indeed very delicate, with the texture of a very soft puree and a taste reminiscent of apples and pears. I also tried a delicata and gruyere soup, which was a huge disappointment: it was somehow too bland and too sweet at the same time (to me, anyway; Dan enjoyed it, but he's easy to please).

With this delicata, I think I finally found a method that really brings out the best flavor of the squash. I left the skin on and chopped the squash in to small chunks, which I tossed with olive oil, salt, and pepper, and roasted at 400 degrees for about twenty-five minutes, stirring once or twice. The result was amazing: the flesh was tender, the skin crispy, and the salt and pepper provided a nice, kicky contrast to the natural sweetness of the squash.


I tossed the warm, roasted squash cubes with dried cranberries and toasted pine nuts and added a simple side salad with mustard vinaigrette. This was a very satisfying and delicious meal, and the leftovers were not leftover for long; Dan couldn't pass through the kitchen without grabbing a few more bites, and I certainly couldn't blame him.