Salads

Blackberry Spinach Salad

I went blackberry picking a few weeks ago and found all of these wonderful plump blackberries.

I love picking berries whether it’s blueberries or blackberries. When my kids where younger I used to take them to pick strawberries. All I remember about those outings is they seemed to stomp on more berries than they actually helped to pick or they were chasing each other around the berry patch.

When we moved to Texas we had berry patches all over the place where we could go pick. But, the one problem was the heat. I remember being able to talk at least one of the kids at a time to go picking for at least 2 hours. After that, they were done and never returned to the berry patch. So now that their berry picking days are behind them, I have to talk a friend into picking with me.

I picked 11 lbs. of blackberries the day we went to this local field and now I’m ready to go pick some blueberries.

Some of these berries were as big as golf balls. I couldn’t resist eating a few right from the vine.

Bake the proscuitto at 350 for about 10-15 minutes and crumble.

I tore some of the yellow flowers apart and sprinkled them over the salad.

Blackberry Spinach Salad

Ingredients

4 c. baby spinach rinsed and dried
1 pint fresh blackberries
4 oz. feta cheese crumbled
1/2 pint cherry tomatoes halved (I used the yellow ones)
2 oz. prosciutto cut very thin
4 green onions sliced thin
1/2 c. walnuts chopped and toasted
edible flowers optional
Dressing:
1 Tbsp. balsamic vinegar
5 tsp. olive oil
1/2 tsp. coarse ground mustard

Instructions

Put the prosciutto on cookie sheet and bake at 350° for 12-15 minutes or crispy, cool, crumble and set aside.
For dressing, whisk together the olive oil, balsamic and mustard. In a large bowl, toss together baby spinach, blackberries, feta cheese, cherry tomatoes, green onions and walnuts. Drizzle with dressing and garnish with edible flowers.