Best Holiday Salad Recipe

Attention! You’ve officially found the best holiday salad recipe!

Need a last minute dish to bring for your Thanksgiving get together? The Real Estate Nation Team’s got you covered with this super easy and DELICIOUS chopped Autumn salad. The amazing, festive ingredients make it so perfect for this time of year. Simple yet delectable honey apple cider dressing, thick n’ crispy bacon, Honey Crisp apples, cranberries, red onion, roasted pepitas, and creamy goat cheese take this salad to the next level. Combined, they truly create the best holiday salad recipe.

Maybe you’ve been tasked to bring some type of side dish, a vegetable, etc. and you want to do something refreshing that isn’t overdone but that also isn’t complicated because let’s face it, you just don’t have the time for that! Well, this one’s a crowd pleaser without all that extra prep. This best holiday salad recipe is inspired by the Little Broken food blog recipe called the Chopped Autumn Salad with Honey Apple Cider Dressing. We decided to use goat cheese rather than feta because of both cheese preference and the thought that goat cheese seems a little more festive for the season. Feel free to use whichever you want! See below for the full list of ingredients and directions to the best holiday salad recipe. Want to switch things up in the stuffing/dressing world? Check out this great pretzel bread stuffing recipe from one of our previous blogs!

INGREDIENTS

SALAD:

• 8 cups of chopped romaine lettuce
• 5 strips of crisply cooked, thick cut bacon, chopped
• 1 medium-sized Honeycrisp apple, cored and chopped
• 1/4 cup dried cranberries
• 1/4 cup finely diced red onion
• 1/3 cup crumbled goat cheese
• 4 Tbsp. toasted pumpkin seeds (pepitas)

DRESSING

• 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
• 1.5 Tbsp. apple cider vinegar
• 2 Tbsp. honey
• 1 tsp. Dijon mustard
• Sea salt and black pepper, to taste

DIRECTIONS

1. Cook the bacon until it is super nice and crispy.
2. Chop up the crisp cooked bacon, lettuce, and apple into medium/small pieces.
3. Finely dice the red onion.
4. In a small bowl, whisk together the olive oil, apple cider vinegar, honey, and Dijon mustard then season with salt and pepper. Set aside.
5. In a large bowl, combine the chopped lettuce, bacon, apple, cranberries, red onion, goat cheese, and pepitas.
6. Pour dressing over the salad and toss to combine. Sprinkle with more salt and pepper if needed. Taste for salt and pepper before serving.