Awesome Arugula Apple Ambrosia + a recipe for glazed pecans

This, my friends, is a salad for the ages.  It has everything–it’s clean, fresh,  sophisticated and it’s delicious. I must admit I got the basic idea for it from one of my favorite pizza places. Brixx is a southeastern chain, very vegan-friendly, the servers really know what that means, and they make a great vegan pizza. If you haven’t tried Brixx, check it out. So as I said, I got the idea from their menu, only mine’s better!

I wanted to buy some glazed pecans, so I could just throw this salad together. I couldn’t find any that didn’t contain honey, so I made some. Very easy, and yep, better than any you can buy in the stores.

SWEET & SPICY  PECANS

1/4 cup maple syrup

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 tsp. chili powder

1/4 tsp. ground ginger

1/2 tsp. salt

2 cups pecan halves

~~~Preheat oven to 250 degrees F.

~~~Mix maple syrup, spices, salt in bowl. Add pecans, stirring to coat.

~~~Spread the pecans on parchment-lined baking sheet. Bake for 30 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool.

This’ll make enough for lots of salads–so pace yourself, don’t eat them all at once!

~~~~Anyway, onto the salad.

Start with a plate of arugula, sprinkle some white balsamic vinegar over. I had a pomegranate-quince vinegar.

Throw on a big handful of pomegranate arils. [Pomegranates are in season and cheap now!]

Sprinkle some dried cranberries over your salad.

Chop an apple, and toss that over your salad.

Toss some glazed pecans over the top. [Resist the urge to make this a pecan salad–they really are that good!]

Lastly, I  had some homemade cashew chevre  and I arranged a few bits over the top. Speaking of which, this is what put this salad over the top!

Garry and I each had a huge dinner plate-size salad and we purred all the way through it. This salad seemed fancy but was really easy, and man, was it good!

Here’s a close-up. Get in there!