Recipe: Apple Manchego Salad (Café Lurcat Copycat)

This apple manchego salad is so simple to make, crunchy and super refreshing. It uses only 5 simple ingredients and is an especially great salad for the fall when apples are best!

If you live in the Minneapolis area, like us, you may recognize this recipe. Cafe Lurcat is a tried and true local favorite restaurant serving New American fare and their apple, cheese and chive salad is famous. This copycat recipe is inspired by that one for good reason!

Apple Manchego Salad Ingredients

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The crunchy apples, sharp cheese and spicy chives are such a perfect combination. We like to use both green apples as well as red for the beautiful color and added flavor. Our favorite red apple is Minnesota’s own Honeycrisp apples for their sweetness and crunch, but you can use any of your favorite varieties as long as they are crunchy!

Manchego cheese, made from sheep’s milk, is salty, nutty and slightly sweet. We can find it at our regular grocery store, but in a bind, you can also use a sharp white cheddar or even swiss cheese.

The key to making this distinct recipe is in the chopping. Cafe Lurcat serves this salad as pictured with the apples and cheese cut into thin matchsticks. When combined, you won’t really be able to see if you’re eating apples or cheese, but luckily you’ll be getting each in every bite!

To cut apples into matchsticks:

1. Slice apples in half from top to bottom
2. Remove center with seeds and stems
3. Cut vertically into 1/4-inch slices
4. Lay slices on top of one another and again, cut into 1/4 inch matchsticks

Place apples into a large bowl. We like to squeeze a bit of lemon onto the matchstick apples in between cutting each apple to prevent browning. Then toss with tongs to make sure they are all covered.

Cut your cheese into matchsticks, chop your chives and toss it all together in a large bowl. It’s okay if the cheese breaks a bit into smaller pieces when tossing – manchego cheese can tend to crumble, but it will still be perfectly delicious!

We love to serve this apple manchego salad to guests as everyone raves about it. Using super simple ingredients, it’s easy to make and super healthy too! We recommend preparing it right before serving or at most keeping it a few hours in a fridge to keep the apple nice and fresh.

You can easily half this recipe if you’re just making it for a few people. We like to make the full version when serving to company but if we’re just making it for ourselves at home, 1 of each apple works great and feeds about 4 as a side or snack.

This apple manchego salad is gluten-free and vegetarian!

Other Favorite Salad Recipes

• Crunchy Detox Kale Salad
• Kale Butternut Squash Salad with Almonds and Goat Cheese
• Grilled Golden Beet Salad With Quinoa and Citrus Dressing

Other Restaurant Copycat Recipes

• Healthy One Pot Zuppa Toscana (Olive Garden)
• Curry Chicken Salad (Trader Joe’s)