This recipe from the Mustards Grill Napa Valley Cookbook
takes spinach salad to a whole new level. The salad base is spinach and frisee leaves. For a long time, I was ambivalent about frisee – it comes in a lot of the salad blends, but it never really stood out to me. Lately I’ve realized that frisee is quite delicious on its own, and have been incorporating it into my everyday cooking.The spinach and frisee are tossed in a unique dressing – when you cook the bacon for this salad, reserve some of the fat in the pan. Balsamic vinegar is added to warm bacon fat and reduced a bit to make an intense, syrupy dressing. Bacon, currants and roasted shallots are also added to the mix.
This was truly an outstanding salad. If you roast the shallots in advance, it can be thrown together quite easily.
Warm spinach and frisee salad
Serves 4
Adapted from Mustards Grill Napa Valley Cookbook6 small shallots, peeled and sliced 1/2 inch thick
2 tsp + 3 T balsamic vinegar
1 T olive oil
3 cups spinach leaves
3 cups frisee leaves
4 slices bacon, sliced crosswise
4 T dried currants
salt and pepper to taste
Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Combine the shallots with the olive oil and 2 teaspoons of balsamic vinegar in a baking dish. Season with salt and pepper, then roast for 20 minutes, or until the shallots are golden brown and tender. Set aside to cool.
To make the dressing, cook the bacon in a large pan over medium high heat, stirring occasionally, until crisp. Using a slotted spoon, transfer the bacon out of the pan and onto paper towels to drain. Leave 1 tablespoon of bacon fat in the pan, drain off the excess. Pour the 3 tablespoons of balsamic vinegar into the pan and cook over medium heat for 2 minutes. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
To assemble, toss the greens with the dressing. Separate the shallots into rings and scatter over the salad. Top with bacon and currants.
69 comments:
Looks great! I have a spinach salad recipe that I make with a warm bacon/maple vinaigrette that I could live on.
What a clear n bright pic Sara..love shallots..:)
your salad is too pretty too eat! i bet it's delicious..the greens looks o fresh, esp the frisee.
Beautiful spinach salad!
Gorgeous salad! Just what we need for our light dinner tomorrow. Yum!
Sara,
I tagged you with an award/meme on my blog!
I've made this salad and I always love it!
Great salad photo!
MMM, I can image the intense syrupy dressing now dripping over a nice piece of bacon....mmmm
Nice shot!
Oh this looks so inviting and lusciously healthy but satisfying Sara!!! Keep up the fab work and stunning looking recipes..
This sounds beautiful, simple and healthy, yet gorgeous enough to serve at a dinner party. Bravo Sara! :) I've grown to like frisee, after a while though ;)
Warm spinach salad is something I've only had in restaurants, but with your recipe, I can now try it at home!
It's amazing how many different varieties of leaf vegetables there are. Aren't frisee leaves coarse and bitter?
Sara- Thats why I love coming to visit you here. You never cook ordinary, all of your stuff is extraordinary and I love reading about it.
Gorgeous salad Sara. I'm trying to learn to love frisee also. I've noticed that sometimes that is the part of the salad I leave on the plate. Shame on me. But I like the idea of mixing it with the spinach. So many spinach salads are too wilted but yours is perfect. I'm going to give it a try.
Sam
Yummmm! I love bacon and shallots! Frisee is yummy, I love the crunch and bitterness of the leaf.
Fantastic recipe - I am a fan of roasting vegetables. So easy and and you don't have to stand over the pan.
Looks so yummy and refreshing!
Balsamic vinegar and bacon fat dressing? Bestill my heart. This sounds incredible.
That salad would be great for my lunch today!
I made a salad last night in the attempt to forget it's in the single digits with wind chill outside... BRRRRR!!!!
A beautiful spinach salad and all those flavours sound amazing together!
That dressing looks so decadent!! I bet paired with those greens it was A.mazing!
I am not a fan of Frisee, but mixing with the spinach, I would try it. Great looking salad Sarah!
Oh Sarah I really like the unique addition of the currants with the spicy frisee! This ihas to be amazing!
I love warm veggies/meat on a cold salad- something just perfect about the combination. Looks like it turned out just perfect!
Looks great. I wish I had some for lunch.
Ooo, hot-cold salads are the best! Yours looks delicious. My favorite (for a little later in the season) is the combination of spinach and strawberries with warm wild mushrooms. Delish!
Spinach salad + bacon is one of my favorite things! I'm super jealous of your picture with Michael C. by the way! :)
Yum, spinach salad! It's lunch time and I've yet to eat. My daughter and I make a spinach salad with warm bacon dressing. We do add shallots but to the warm dressing. Yours looks good.
While I've eaten frisee in salad blends. I can't remember what it tastes like, weird. I guess I'm going to go for a salad for lunch today. :-)
~ingrid
MMMMM...that is a sald for me!!! Spinach & bacon,MMMMMM
I love a light refreshing salad. thank you for this fabulous recipe
Beautiful picture! I'm on a total salad kick right now, so this will be fun to try!
Looks healthy and delicious - I love spinach with bacon.
Definitely a yummy looking salad!
This spinach salad looks much better than my spinach salad I just ate!
So pretty! Look at your photo skills :)
Funny, I made bacon for breakfast on Sunday (microwaved it) and my apartment smelled like bacon for several days.
That sounds like my kind of salad - I love new spins on a classic!
OOh, Sarah. Not only delicious sounding, but gorgeous. This really takes me into thoughts of spring. YUM.
Their are such great flavors going on here! It's real delicious and refreshing!
If I swapped dried crans for the currants, I think that salad would have all my favorite things in it! Yum!
that looks like a great salad - i'm always too lazy to make salads though...even though they're really not THAT much work :P
That is a great looking salad. Perfect for nice lunch!
I love adding balsamic to my sauteed onions. Your salad look wonderful, and your picture is beautiful, as always.
This would be great w/o the bacon too. I love balsamic vinegar on onions- raw or sauteed.
gorgeous salads!
love when they are warm!
I'm think I should just go to your blog before I grocery shop.
spinach with balsamic and im sold! gorgeous salad :)
I love spinach salad, Sounds perfect with the balsamic! I wish my children would eat this. They do not know what they are missing.
Definitely the kind of salads I would eat until the last leaf! Love frisee and bacon and shallots!
wonderful shot and am feeling too fresh on seeinr ur pic
Frisee takes salads to a new level! Great recipe!!
Beautiful salad. Salads can seem so boring but with they can also be great with some thought.
Another droolworthy food photo--now I want a salad! (And I don't usually want salad.)
i don't really like the taste or feel of frisee in my mouth, but this is great--there's bacon to compensate. :)
I have been to this restaurant several times over the years on our trips to Napa, we love it! This salad looks gorgeous!
Love bacon in salad...actually in anything! The dressing with bacon "oil" sounds incredible. Thanks, and thanks for stopping by!
ps, I have something for you on my blog!
Love that dressing! Warm bacon grease is always a good thing.
Looks healthy AND delicious! Perfect!
That is one of the best looking salads I have ever seen! You are so talented! Thank you for the post :-)
yum, yum, yum!!! This sounds (and looks) so good...love the nice, meaty pieces of bacon. :)
Bacon fat as the oil in a dressing...GENIUS! That salad looks absolutely scrumptious, thanks for the post!
Fabulous looking salad, Sara, and what a wonderful combination of flavors.
Thanks for the comments on my blog! Looks like you've got quite a blog...your recipes are so fun and fancy!
This was as good as it looks.
The dressing sounds so tasty! I don't like warm lettuce but on spinach - YUM!
What a great looking salad! I've never tried cranberries with the spinach/bacon combo, but it sounds like a winner. You always seem to find some of the best recipes!
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