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This is the ultimate low-carb winter salad for your holiday table! It has the perfect balance of flavours. There's sweetness from roasted pumpkin, balsamic vinegar and dried cranberries, paired with creamy and salty goat's cheese and finally crunchy pecans, all nested in a bed of soft leaf lettuce.
This festive winter salad would be best served with roast turkey, chicken, pork or fish. I think it will go really well with this Butter Blanketed Roast Turkey recipe, Roast Spatchcock Chicken or Ginger Spiced Pork Roast but you could serve it with roast salmon or on its own as a light low-carb dinner.
Using Fresh Cranberries Instead of Dried Cranberries?
If you don't have homemade Sugar-Free Dried Cranberries on hand, you can use baked cranberries instead. Cranberries prepared this way won't be as chewy as properly dehydrated cranberries but they will work just fine in this low-carb recipe.
To bake cranberries, place about 1/2 cup (57 g/ 2 oz) of fresh halved cranberries (or frozen and defrosted) in a baking tray and drizzle with about 2 teaspoons of melted coconut oil or ghee. Sprinkle with 1 tablespoon of low-carb sweetener. Allulose works best but you can use any Erythritol based sweeteners, or Swerve. Bake for 20 minutes at 175 °C/ 350 °F (fan assisted), or 195 °C/ 380 °F (conventional). Done!
Hands-on Overall
Serving size about 140 g/ 5 oz
Nutritional values (per serving, about 140 g/ 5 oz)
Net carbs5.9 grams
Protein5.4 grams
Fat23.6 grams
Calories257 kcal
Calories from carbs 9%, protein 8%, fat 83%
Total carbs8.1 gramsFiber2.1 gramsSugars2.9 gramsSaturated fat7.4 gramsSodium147 mg(6% RDA)Magnesium25 mg(6% RDA)Potassium315 mg(16% EMR)
Ingredients (makes 4 side servings)
Salad:
Dressing:
Instructions
- To make this recipe you will need my Sugar-Free Dried Cranberries. If you don't have time to make them, you can use baked cranberries instead (see tips in the post above).
- Preheat the oven to 200 °C/ 400 °F (fan assisted), or 220 °C/ 425 °F (conventional). Peel and cut the pumpkin into bite sized cubes (no peeling needed if you use Hokkaido squash).
- Place pumpkin in a single layer on a baking tray and drizzle with ghee (or olive oil) and season with salt and pepper. Bake for about 20 minutes. Remove from oven and let cool.
- To make the dressing, in a small bowl mix the olive oil, mustard (Dijon or yellow) and balsamic vinegar.
- To serve, tear the lettuce in a salad bowl and scatter the roasted pumpkin, goat's cheese (or feta), cranberries and roughly chopped pecans (or walnuts) over the top. (You can optionally dry roast the nuts on a hot pan for 1-2 minutes.)
- Finish by drizzling the prepared dressing over the salad. This salad is best served fresh but can be kept in the fridge for up to a day. This recipe is enough to make 4 side servings (try with this Butter Blanketed Roast Turkey recipe), or 2 regular servings.
Ingredient nutritional breakdown (per serving, about 140 g/ 5 oz)
| Net carbs | Protein | Fat | Calories |
|---|
| Cranberries, Sugar-Free Dried (KetoDiet blog) |
| 1.6 g | 0.1 g | 0.7 g | 14 kcal |
| Pumpkin, fresh |
| 3 g | 0.5 g | 0.1 g | 13 kcal |
| Ghee, clarified butter |
| 0 g | 0 g | 3.8 g | 34 kcal |
| Salt, sea salt |
| 0 g | 0 g | 0 g | 0 kcal |
| Pepper, black, spices |
| 0 g | 0 g | 0 g | 0 kcal |
| Goat cheese, fresh (soft) |
| 0 g | 3.5 g | 4 g | 50 kcal |
| Pecans, nuts |
| 0.3 g | 0.6 g | 4.9 g | 47 kcal |
| Lettuce, green leaf, raw |
| 0.8 g | 0.7 g | 0.1 g | 8 kcal |
| Olive oil, extra virgin |
| 0 g | 0 g | 10.1 g | 90 kcal |
| Dijon mustard |
| 0 g | 0 g | 0 g | 0 kcal |
| Balsamic vinegar, dark (excludes sweet, syrupy vinegar) |
| 0.2 g | 0 g | 0 g | 1 kcal |
| Total per serving, about 140 g/ 5 oz |
| 5.9 g | 5.4 g | 23.6 g | 257 kcal |
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