Maple-Glazed Steak Salad with Blue Cheese

Maple and blue cheese meet in a perfect pair, on a bed of greens and a sweet, maple-glazed steak. This happens to be my favorite “meal” salad, and it needs nothing else. It’s sugaring season, when the sap in the maple trees is running, and while we do notice our maples in the backyard running, we don’t actually tap our own. However, down on the reservation where Ole works, they most definitely are participating in the sugaring off: taping and boiling, which inevitably leads to baking. But this time I’m not baking. I’ve done plenty of that too, and I plan to do more. But this is about maple’s savory side, in a salad. A salad that my “no sweets or nuts in my salad” husband ate and admitted to liking.

It starts with apple cider vinegar. This happens to be the regular variety because we bought it at Target, but I’m going to recommend you use raw, unfiltered cider vinegar. Our bottle exploded in the garage this winter when the temperature hit -14, much like our back patio door, and I had yet to replace it.

Mix the vinegar with the same amount of pure maple syrup.

Pour it over your steak and let it sit and marinade for at least 30 minutes.

Add just enough maple syrup to cover a small amount of walnuts. Who needs croutons when you have glazed nuts on your salad?

Spread the coated nuts on a parchment-lined cookie sheet. The parchment will keep them from sticking.

After about 7 minutes, when the maple is brittle, remove them from the oven and allow to cool.

For the vinaigrette, mix together apple cider vinegar, maple syrup, a bit of minced garlic, some fresh herbs, salt and pepper.

Whisk in some extra virgin olive oil and it’s ready to go.

Pull the steak out of the marinade and toss it on a preheated grill, seasoning lightly with salt and pepper. Flip and rotate the steaks three times for 2-4 minutes a side.

Let the steak rest for five minutes while you assemble the salad.

Start by halving a few tomatoes and dicing a small bunch of scallions.

Layer, starting with the spring mix.

Diced scallions.

Tomatoes.

Blue cheese.

Roasted walnuts.

Then slice the steak thinly.


And add the steak strips to the salad.

Drizzle on the vinaigrette. Be sure to shake or whisk first.

And enjoy. What I love about this salad is how well the maple complements the saltiness of the blue cheese and the tang of the apple cider vinegar. I’ve made this for the kids before while Ole was teaching, and I am always amazed at their willingness to eat all of it without complaint. This time was no different, and Ole even managed to set aside his salad biases and was pleasantly surprised.