Spinach at the Maplewood Farmers’ Market, mid-April 2011

Make This: Spinach Salad with Warm Bacon Dressing

The looks, smells, and tastes of locally grown leafy spinach makes for some great eating at the local markets. You’ll find baby spinach, tiny and mild, from YellowTree Farm. Owners Justin and Danielle Leszcz are new to the Maplewood market, but they’ve been rocking the food scene supplying local chefs with tasty product for the past two years.

 

 

Amy Cloud of Three Rivers Community Farm sold a hoop house grown spinach, tender and sweet. I chose her overwintered spinach, a crinkly, lush leaf with a sweet, assertive taste that delivers a heft and a bounce in your mouth. Try it in salads or plunk a few leaves on a sandwich. A friend overwintered spinach a few years back and I was delighted to discover the intense flavor and highly textured leaves.

I paired the overwintered spinach with dry-cured bacon from Lucien Matoushek of The Farmer’s Larder for Spinach Salad with Warm Bacon Dressing. I used this recipe from The Farmer’s Larder website. The only tweak: I made more dressing, increasing the bacon and the cider vinegar to 4 tablespoons and the sugar to ¾ teaspoon.

The bacon, thick and aromatic, fried up crisp in no time. The taste is complex, sweet and salty, the texture perfect, the cooked onions and garlic inspired. Plus, my house smelled great all evening.

Buy This:

• Dry-cured bacon from The Farmer’s Larder
• Fresh, darkly green spinach of your choice
• Farm-fresh eggs from Livesprings Farm
• Artisan bread from the bakery of your choice: Black Bear Bakery, Companion Bakery, 4 Seasons Bakery or the St. Louis University School of Nutrition

From Your Pantry:

• Cider vinegar
• Sugar
• Garlic
• Red onion
• Salt and pepper

In Your Fridge:

• Great butter for the bread

Comments

[Stlsandy]

Bacon! I want bacon! This recipe sounds great and just looking at the photo made me hungry. How nice to know just where to find the freshest ingredients instead of the ones shipped the longest number of miles to the store. I can't wait to read more as everything ripens.