Crisp Green Leaf Salad with NZ Blue Cheese Dressing

Make the dressing ahead to allow its flavours to mingle, overnight is perfect. This dressing will keep for a few days as it makes enough to fill a medium-sized jar - or make half quantity for this amount of cos lettuce.

Serves 4

NZ Blue Cheese dressing

• -  150g NZ Blue Cheese

• -  125g Cream Fraiche

• -  5 tablespoons full cream milk, plus more if needed to thin

• -  3 tablespoons store-bought mayonnaise

  Salad

• -  2 cos lettuce, washed and dried

• -  4 rashers bacon, cooked until crisp and cut into pieces

• -  a small bunch of chives

To make the dressing, crumble the blue cheese in your finger into a bowl. Add the crème fraiche, milk and mayonnaise and season with salt. Stir with a fork to combine, cover and keep in the fridge.

Cut the lettuce lengthways into 4 long pieces and arrange in a shallow plate. Spoon over enough dressing to moisten and crumble over the bacon. Snip over the chives. Put extra dressing in a small serving bowl as you will probably want more!

Serve salad and dressing and pass the black pepper grinder or sprinkle with a few Aleppo pepper flakes before serving.

Tips

• -  if the dressing is a little thick, thin it down with extra milk

• -  try it as a blue cheese dressing on a beef burger

• -  we loved it with vegetable crudites too