Cranberry Spinach Salad, Revisited

2/13/09: Although it is a completely different recipe, I couldn't help but notice how much this salad resembles the Strawberry Spinach one I posted earlier this week. I made it, in part, because I still had those ingredients on hand. This recipe happens to be the top rated salad on Allrecipes.com. Everyone on the site leaves their opinion on how to improve upon it, but I decided to give it ago with the original recipe (besides decreasing the sugar a bit). It is super simple: spinach, almonds, and cranberries. And the dressing only takes a minute to whip (or rather emulsify) together. This makes a LARGE salad, so unless you are feeding a crowd I suggest cutting the recipe in half (or 1/4 as I did). And it is a great salad. Number one? Not quite. It is definitely good, but yesterday's Strawberry Spinach salad swept me off my feet. Worth making again though!

4/28/09: My mom granted me half of her Costco-size bag of sliced almonds which gets along well with the enormous (also from Costco) bag of Craisins sitting in my pantry. If only I had an endless supply of spinach, we could have this salad every day! I did revise the dressing recipe, but only slightly. I felt like the sesame seeds were taking over the salad, and so I halved the suggested amount. And the original recipe calls for white sugar, but from now on I'll use organic cane sugar or honey for an unrefined sweetener. Such an excellent salad- one I will be making over and over again!

INGREDIENTS
3/4 cup sliced almonds, toasted
1 lb. baby spinach

1 cup dried cranberries

Dressing:
1 Tbsp. toasted sesame seeds
1 Tbsp. poppy seeds
4 tsp. organic cane sugar or HONEY
2 tsp. minced onion
1/4 tsp. paprika
1/4 cup white wine vinegar
1/4 cup cider vinegar
1/2 cup canola or olive oil

DIRECTIONS

1. In a medium saucepan over low heat, cook and stir almonds until lightly toasted. Remove from heat, and let cool.

2. In a large bowl, combine the spinach with the toasted almonds and cranberries.

3. In a medium bowl, whisk together the sesame seeds, poppy seeds, sugar, onion, paprika, white wine vinegar, cider vinegar, and oil. Toss with spinach just before serving.

Serves 8.

(Adapted from All Recipes)