Salad with nuts and fresh fruits - proportions
I want to make a more complete salad with walnuts, blueberries, and apple, but I'm not sure how much of each ingredient to use to get it balanced. What are the more or less standard proportions?
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The base is that nuts shouldn't dominate the salad because they're really concentrated, so something like 30-40 grams of walnuts per person is good. Fresh fruits (blueberries and apple in your case) should be the star, so figure on about 100-150 grams between the two, depending on how much greens (lettuce, spinach) you have as your base. A simple proportion is roughly one medium apple chopped up, a handful of blueberries, and that little bit of nuts per plate; try it and adjust it to your taste because in the end it's just a matter of what you like.
How many people will be eating, and what kind of salad do you prefer - lighter or heartier? Because that really affects the amounts.
In my case, when I make this at home I usually go for something like this: for a normal-sized salad (let's say as a main course) I calculate about 150-200 grams of greens as the base, then I add around 40-50 grams of chopped nuts (because dried fruit takes up a lot of visual space but weighs very little), a medium apple cut into cubes or thin slices, and a generous handful of fresh blueberries. The key thing is that the blueberries and apple have to be more than the nuts, because otherwise the salad becomes too heavy and dense.
What works well is keeping a ratio like 60% base greens, 20% fresh fruit, 15% dried fruit, and 5% other stuff (cheese if you add it, red onion...). With apple and blueberries specifically, the apple can be more or less depending on what you like; if you like it acidic, a whole apple is fine; if you find it too strong, half is enough. Don't hesitate to add plenty of blueberries - they give color, flavor, and they're light. Try it this way once and then adjust based on how it turns out.
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