This Will Change Your Mind...

About Salad 🥗

Apr 01, 2023

“Salad” has become a popular target for trashing in the last decade or so.

Especially with meat-maxi influencers who compare a salad to rabbit food or a caloric trap.

I would say that you can’t even call yourself a good cook, let alone “chef”, if you can’t make a salad that feels like pleasure to eat… not pain.

It requires skill, intuition and proper seasoning to take leafy greens and add ingredients that compliment the natural flavor of the greens, whilst providing some good texture and then a sauce to bring it all together.

To keep things simple today I’m going to take you to Lyon, France 🇫🇷 for the number one salad I would make any salad hater: Salad Lyonnaise

A quick sidenote: You’ll notice many preparations in French cooking are named after a region. Example: parisienne potatoes (Paris), herbs de provence (Provence), Pommes Lyonnaise (Potatoes in the style of Lyon).

Salad Lyonnaise

The city of Lyon, France is the soul of French cooking. With legends like Paul Bocuse setting up shop in Lyon, it’s the perfect representation of French cuisine. Rich flavors, lots of meat and cheese, with seasonal vegetables in a supporting role.

Heck, the Bocuse d’Or (which is like the culinary Olympic games, is held in Lyon… not Paris).

Getting to what makes this salad so great.

The base of this salad is frisee lettuce. This is a green that is in the chicory family and has frilled leaves. It’s also known as ‘leafy endive’. It retains a crisp texture and peppery flavor on the palate.

The greens are garnished with crispy bacon pieces, called lardon, and 2 poached eggs. This gives a salty, meaty flavor and the poached eggs are cut open and the gooey yolks mixed into the greens.

But what about the dressing?

That’s the ingenious part.

The leftover bacon fat from rendering out the lardon, is used to saute finely chopped shallot then red (or sherry) wine vinegar and dijon mustard are stirred in. This makes a warm dressing that is poured over the greens, tossed and then the lardon and poached eggs are placed atop to finish.

If you have fresh chives and parsley, finely chopped would make a nice addition but not mandatory.

There are (4) separate cooking techniques contained in this 1 salad that every cook should know

-Properly cleaning greens

-Rendering fat fully from bacon

-Making a warm vinaigrette

-Poaching eggs

Just from that list alone you can see anyone who says “making salad isn’t cooking” doesn’t know what they’re talking about.

The good news?

This can be made in ~15 mins if you’re organized

Let’s cook this up.

Ingredients

8oz slab bacon, cut into lardons (approx 2 inch by 1/2 inch matchsticks)

4 large eggs

2-3 heads of Frisee lettuce, cores removed

1/4 c good quality red wine vinegar (or sherry wine vinegar)

2 small shallots, finely chopped

1 TB dijon mustard

2 TB distilled vinegar

2 TB sea salt, plus 1 tsp divided

1 tsp cracked black pepper

Method

Get a medium saucepot (6qt) filled 3/4 with water, add 2 TB sea salt and the distilled vinegar. Cover with a lid and heat over high heat.
In a medium saute pan, add the bacon lardons and cook over medium heat. We do not want the bacon to cook too fast. We want the fat to all render out first, then brown and crisp to finish. Use medium heat, no hotter.
While the bacon is rendering and water is warming, take the frisee and submerge in 2-3 changes of cool water. Then spin dry in a salad spinner or dry thoroughly in between paper towels. Set aside. (This is a must. A fair amount of silt/dirt will probably come out and this will also help the greens stay crisp.)
Stir the lardons occasionally. Finely chop the shallots and crack the eggs into shallow bowls, ready for poaching, while the water continues to heat.
When the lardons are crispy (10-12mins), remove from the bacon fat with a slotted spoon onto a paper towel lined plate.
Keep the pan over medium heat and add the shallots, sweat for 2-3 mins in the bacon fat. Add the red wine vinegar and dijon mustard. Stir briskly with a wooden spoon until the mixture is uniform and emulsified. (Maybe 60 seconds). Season with salt and pepper. Turn off heat.
Now poach the eggs: Remove lid, when the water is at a bare simmer (~195F) take a mixing spoon and stir the water into circles 4 or 5 times. Carefully drop the cracked eggs, one by one, into the swirling water (stirring the top once or twice between eggs). The best place to drop the eggs in the water is halfway between the center of the pot and edge.
Turn the heat to lowest setting. Gently stir the top surface to keep the eggs slightly moving. You’ll notice all the loose white will float to the top. Then 2-3 mins later the eggs will rise to the top.
While the eggs are poaching pour the warm vinaigrette over the frisee and mix. Divide the greens between 2 plates and distribute the lardons over the greens.
Now the eggs should be ready, carefully remove one-by-one from the water with a slotted spoon. Blot the spoon on a paper towel and season the egg with a dash of sea salt. Place on the salad to finish. Repeat 3 times.
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The salad is now ready to crush. I highly recommend splitting the egg yolks open and mix all into the greens and vinaigrette.