Fall Salad, brought to you by the letter P

I like alliterative recipes.

I've stated before that I don't approve of lettuce. Thus, my salads tend to be heavy on non-lactucal ingredients. Serves two.

Cut two fuyu persimmons into sixths, cut off the peel, and slice into thin wedges. Collect the seeds from 1/3 pomegranate. Peel two pears and slice into thin wedges. (See how I sliced the pears lengthwise in the photo? Don't do that. They're much harder to arrange artfully. While we're learning from my mistakes, let's toast 1/4 cup of pecans in a dry pan over medium heat. Let's not burn them.)

One must dress the pears to avoid unsightly discoloration. I figure there's a threefold choice for dressings here- I used a fairly typical three parts balsamic to four parts olive oil, dash of salt, dash of sugar dressing. One could embrace the fallishness of the whole thing, use fresh pressed olive oil, the very first lemons, and a dash of apple cider. One could also make a mirin, rice vinegar, and grapeseed oil dressing. Aim for 1/4 cup total dressing.

Wash one head butter lettuce and 1/2 head escarole. (Or one head leaf lettuce or romaine. I like the bitterness of the escarole, because it reminds me of high school.) Tear into small pieces and dress with half the chosen dressing. Arrange on salad plates. Place persimmon slices and pear slices over the lettuce. Drizzle remaining dressing over the salad. Top with pomegranate seeds and pecans. Or pine nuts. Pistachios. I think the theme is exhausted.

Alternatively, you could mix everything together in a large bowl and serve it out of that. Or eat directly from the serving bowl. Or just chew on leaves you find on the forest floor.