Spinach Salad with Hot Bacon Dressing

Adapted from Alton Brown

A classic salad with fresh spinach, bacon, fresh mushrooms, red onions and a perfectly cooked hard boiled egg drizzled with a tangy sweet hot bacon dressing. It’s the perfect mix of flavors and a long-time favorite of mine. I tried making it years ago and failed … so I decided it was time to try again and THIS time it turned out … SO … good!

I used a couple different techniques to make this the BEST spinach bacon salad ever. How, you might ask, did I manage to improve upon one of Alton Brown’s recipes? He is SUCH a good cook! Yeah, he is … I really love his recipes and this one is no exception. Honestly, I didn’t change the ingredients significantly, but I did employ a couple techniques that really do improve the flavor of this delightful salad.

First, I used my Instant Pot to cook the hard boiled eggs. When I got my Instant Pot for Christmas last year, I never dreamed that the number one thing I would use it for is to hard boil (or soft boil) eggs, but seriously it is the easiest way to get a perfectly cooked soft or hard boiled egg, and whether the eggs or fresh or not, they peel so easily when you pressure cook them! Since my son is totally in love with Scotch Eggs, we pull out the Instant Pot multiple times a week to whip up an easy lactose-free meal.

But I digress … back to the salad. The other thing I did to improve the sweet, tangy, bacon-y dressing for this salad was I baked the bacon in the oven on a silicon baking mat. This technique is soooo much better than pan-frying because it renders the fat beautifully, with none of that black grime that you get when you pan-fry your bacon. The silicon baking mat keeps the bacon from sticking to the pan and helps render and pour off the fat. The fat is clear and bacon-y and absolutely delicious. I keep it in a jar in my fridge and use it in my cooking ALL the time in place of butter or olive oil, whenever I want a little smoky bacon flavor. I call it “bacon butter” because it hardens in the fridge, like butter does.

Spinach Salad with Hot Bacon Dressing

• Prep Time: 15 minutes
• Cook Time: 30 minutes
• Total Time: 45 minutes
• Yield: About 4 servings 1x

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Ingredients

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• 1 package bacon
• 2 – 4 eggs

For the dressing:

• 3 Tablespoons rendered bacon fat
• 3 Tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon sugar
• 1 teaspoon dijon mustard
• Salt & freshly ground pepper, to taste

For the salad:

• Fresh spinach
• A bit of crumbled, cooked bacon
• Fresh sliced mushrooms
• Thin red onion slices
• Hard-boiled egg, sliced

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Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Line a baking sheet with a silicone baking mat and lay the bacon on the mat, overlapping the slices slightly. Bake at 350 F. for 15 – 30 minutes or until done to your liking. Remove the bacon onto a plate lined with paper towels to absorb excess fat. Chop or crumble the bacon.
2. Meanwhile, hard boil the eggs. It’s super easy in a pressure cooker and they peel so much easier. Add 1 cup of water to the cooker, set the eggs on the rack inside, pressure cook for 5 minutes. Quick release the steam, then plunge the eggs in ice water. Peel enough eggs to allow for about 1 egg per person.
3. While the bacon and eggs are cooking, assemble the salad(s): line salad plate(s) with spinach, sprinkle with bacon, mushrooms and red onion slices. Add slices of hard boiled egg.
4. To make the dressing: carefully pour the warm rendered fat from the baking sheet into a jar. Take 3 Tablespoons of the fat and put it in a bowl. Whisk in the red wine vinegar, then the sugar and mustard. Add salt & pepper to taste.
5. Drizzle the salads with about 1/4 of the warm dressing per person.

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Notes

I make extra bacon, chop it and freeze it so I have ready made bacon bits on hand for salads, breakfasts, pizza, etc. I also save the rendered fat for cooking.

You can make one or two salads at a time, saving the excess dressing in a jar and the eggs in the fridge, then at serving time, warm the bacon and dressing for a few seconds in the microwave before adding to the salad.

RECIPE SOURCE: http://www.sumptuousspoonfuls.com/

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