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Sainte-Maure de Touraine Salad with Apples and Pistachio Butter

Tenaya Darlington
Sainte-Maure was soft-spoken, more fragile. He reclined on the couch in his gray fur coat and murmured in his sleep about a salad. “Pistachios,” he whispered, his whiskers twitching, “apples, grapes.” I darted into the kitchen and rummaged for my mandoline. A cheese so delicate requires a salad of thin shavings, I think. Using a mandoline, I shredded cucumbers and apples, a few green onions, and then I tossed these with greens and some lemon. Nothing more. Instead of adding pistachios on top, I climbed into the fridge to root out a jar of pistachio butter. The inspiration came from a salad I once ate that was served on a swirl of homemade pistachio butter—I love the memory of the fork tines catching on a little bit of that cream as I swept up each bite of salad.
Servings 2

Ingredients
  

  • ½ green apple thinly sliced
  • 1 celery stalk thinly sliced
  • 1 green onion thinly sliced
  • 2 handfuls of mixed greens
  • half a lemon
  • sea salt
  • dill and mint for garnish
  • handfuls of grapes
  • 4 tablespoons pistachio butter see note
  • Sainte-Maure de Touraine

Instructions
 

  • Toss apple slices, celery, green onion, and greens in a bowl with lemon and sea salt. Mix with your hands. Serve on a plate you have prepared with a good shmear of pistachio butter. Sprinkle with fresh herbs and grapes, and top with a few sliced rounds of Sainte Maure de Touraine

Notes

You can buy prepared pistachio butter, which I used initially. Then I tried making my own using a recipe from Coffee and Quinoa. All you have to do is combine a cup of pistachios with honey in a food processor—add some coconut oil along the way to smooth things out. The results are delicious, but I didn’t achieve quite the same ultra creamy consistency I yearned for. Just sayin’.