Bacon and egg salad.
Eating is a funny thing. No, really, it is. It’s so natural and instinctive, and yet it’s amazing how much thought we do put into it. For example, when I sit down in front of a plate of food, I automatically and almost sub-consciously divvy it up in my mind so my “proportions” are right. I like to have a little bit of everything that’s on my plate in every mouthful. I mean, whoever created the meal put all the elements together because they go together, right? They’re meant to be consumed at the same time. Surely. So I assess how much of each item I need in each mouthful if I’m going to have enough mouthfuls of everything to go around.
Is this odd?
Likewise, when I am preparing meals I also like to make sure there’s enough of everything for each person to eat with every mouthful. In my mind, it’s about balance.
On the other hand, Hubby likes to eat each element on the plate separately. I’ll tell you a little secret that I am sure he has never guessed: this drives me a leeeeeeetle bit crazy, especially when I’m trying to introduce him to a new flavour but it’s not one even I would eat without a bit of dilution. I mean, there are lots of foods I am happy to eat as part of a meal but it doesn’t mean I like them enough to eat them alone. Still, that’s how Hubby has always done it, and that’s how he’ll always do it. Diff’rent strokes and I love him to bits despite this rather incomprehensible flaw. 😉
This salad is a really easy one to throw together, using whatever proportions of salad veg work for you. There is no right or wrong so adjust ingredients just how you like them. The key to enjoyment is, like all meals, in using fresh, real food that you like to eat.
The most time-consuming aspect of putting the salad together from scratch is boiling the eggs (I mean, have you ever waited for water to boil? Bleugh!) but I do a batch about once a week and use them as required. (For perfect hard boiled eggs see How to Cook a Perfect Hard-boiled Egg.) And if you happen to have bacon for breakfast, throw on an extra slice with this salad in mind. And even if you don’t have mayonnaise handy, it’s super quick and easy to make yourself — and generally a lot healthier than anything you’ll find in the supermarket. I keep my home-made mayo in a tightly-sealed jar in the fridge and it lasts for weeks.
I like to keep this salad fairly basic in its ingredients, not wanting to complicate flavours too much so the bacon and egg are really the stars of the show, but by all means add whatever appeals to your own taste buds. For example, I’m not fond of raw tomato but like the contrasty splash of red the capsicum lends to the salad. You might really love tomato and prefer to halve some cherry tomatoes and scatter those over instead. If so, then use tomatoes.
15 minPrep Time
5 minCook Time
20 minTotal Time
Save RecipeIngredients
- 1-2 cups lettuce, enough to cover your plate
- 6-8 thin slices cucumber
- 1 thin slice red onion, cut in half
- 1 section red capsicum, thinly sliced
- 1/2 rasher bacon
- 1 hard boiled egg, preferably organic and free range (see How to Cook a Perfect Hard-Boiled Egg
- 1-2 tbsp home-made mayonnaise
- Parmesan cheese (optional), to taste. Use any other cheese of your choice if you don’t like Parmesan. Or leave it out altogether if you don’t eat cheese.
- freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Heat a frying pan to high and cook the bacon until crispy and golden on both sides. Drain and set aside to cool.
- Spread the lettuce on a plate. Arrange the cucumber more or less evenly over the lettuce.
- Scatter the red onion and capsicum (or tomato) over the lettuce and cucumber.
- Roughly chop the cooked bacon and scatter over the salad.
- Peel the hard-boiled egg and cut in halves then quarters. Cut each quarter in half again, giving you 8 thin wedges. Arrange these over the salad.
- Shave some Parmesan cheese over the salad. I use a vegetable peeler. Use however much you like, depending on how much you like it. If using another hard cheese, cut into small cubes and scatter over the salad. Or just skip this step.
- Dollop on the mayonnaise. If it is quite thick, put just a little bit at a time on a teaspoon, dispersing little blobs as evenly as you can until you think you have enough.
- Grind some black pepper over the salad to your taste, then serve.
