Recipe of the Day Categories:
Recipe Home
Recipe Index
Recipe Search
Appetizers
Beef
Beverage
Bread
Breakfast
Cake
Chocolate
Cookies
Fish
Fruit
Main
Dish
Pasta
Pies
Pork
Poultry
Salad
Seafood
Side Dish
Soup
Vegetable
Surprise!
 
Sara Moulton's
Everyday Family
Dinners
Mushrooms
Photographic Print
Buy at AllPosters.com
Green Olive, White Bread,
Parmesan and Olive Oil
Photographic Print
Buy at AllPosters.com
Cooking.com
|
|
Your
patronage of our affiliate
partners supports this web site.
We thank you! In other words, please shop at LBC
Gift Galerie!
Spinach
Buy This at Allposters.com
La Belle Cuisine
The Ultimate Spinach Salad
Sara Moulton
Cooks at Home
by Sara Moulton, 2002,
Broadway Books/Random House
 
“I just love salad. When I’m in the city, I eat
salad every day for lunch.
When I’m on the road for business, I often order
salad from room service
for dinner. Of course, I understand that not
everyone shares this leafy
passion, (take my husband, please) so when I make
a salad at home or
for guests in the Gourmet dining room, I try to dress it
up.
I think of this as the ultimate spinach salad because all of the elements –
other than the spinach and the mushrooms – are special. The blue cheese
dressing is prepared from scratch with good blue cheese. The croutons are
homemade from rustic Italian bread. The bacon bits are spiced. And the
lowly
hard-boiled egg is cooked with extra love to eliminate the green line
dividing the yolk and the white and to keep the white tender. Try it and
see if you don’t agree that this salad is the ultimate.”
Serves 4
to 6 as a main course, 8 as an appetizer
1/4 cup mayonnaise
1/4 cup sour cream
1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese, preferably
Roquefort, Stilton or Cabrales
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
Kosher salt and freshly ground
black pepper to taste
2 to 3 tablespoons whole milk
1 1/2 pounds fresh spinach leaves
3 hard-boiled eggs*, peeled and
sliced or coarsely chopped
3 to 4 medium cultivated white mushrooms
1 1/2 cups Parmesan Croutons (recipe follows)
Spiced Bacon Bits (recipe follows) or 1/2 pound
bacon, cooked until crisp
and crumbled
*
Place the eggs in a large saucepan and pour in enough cold water
to cover by
1 inch. Bring to a boil over high heat. Remove from the
heat, cover, and set
aside for 15 minutes, Transfer the eggs to a bowl
of half ice and half
water. Cool completely and then peel under cold
running water. [Sara says
she learned this method from
Julia Child.
It is foolproof.]
Combine the mayonnaise and sour cream in a small bowl. Stir
until
blended and smooth. Fold in the cheese, vinegar, mustard, garlic,
and
Worcestershire sauce, Season with salt and pepper. Stir well
and
thin with
milk as needed to reach the consistency of sour
cream.
Cover and refrigerate
for several hours or overnight. Stir
well
before serving.
Rinse the spinach leaves and dry them in a salad spinner or use paper
towels
to remove as much moisture as possible from the leaves. Tear
the leaves into
bite-size pieces and pile into a very large salad bowl.
Arrange the eggs and
mushrooms on top. Sprinkle with croutons
and bacon bits. Spoon a large
dollop of the dressing in the center.
Toss well just before serving and
serve the remaining dressing on
the side.
Parmesan Croutons
Makes about 3 cups
2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
1 garlic clove, minced
1/2 teaspoon dried oregano, crumbled
1/2 teaspoon dried basil, crumbled
1/2 teaspoon dried thyme, crumbled
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
1/2 loaf rustic Italian bread, about 6 ounces,
cut into 3/4-inch cubes
(3 to 4 cups)
2 tablespoons freshly grated
Parmigiano-Reggiano
Additional kosher salt and freshly ground
black pepper to taste
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Mix the oil, garlic, oregano, basil,
thyme, salt and pepper in a large bowl. Add the bread and toss well.
Spread
out on a jelly-roll pan and bake in the middle of the oven until
lightly
browned, about 15 minutes. Sprinkle the croutons with the
cheese and bake
until golden brown, about 7 minutes longer. Season
with salt and pepper and
cool. The croutons will keep in an airtight
container for 1 week.
Spiced Bacon Bits
Makes
about 3/4 cup
1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
1 1/2 teaspoons firmly packed brown sugar
1/8 teaspoon cayenne pepper or more to taste
1/8 teaspoon ground allspice
Freshly ground black pepper to taste
1/2 pound lean bacon, cut into 1/4-inch squares
Combine the Worcestershire sauce, sugar, cayenne and allspice
in
a small bowl. Season with pepper. Add the bacon and toss until the
bacon
is well coated.
Place the bacon in a large skillet over medium-low heat. Cook, stirring
often, until the bacon is crisp, about 10 minutes. Transfer to paper
towels
to drain. This will keep covered in the refrigerator for 3 days.
Mushrooms: When you are planning to eat cultivated mushrooms
raw,
make
sure they are fresh, fresh, fresh. If you have ever had a
spinach
salad at a
restaurant that arrived with slimy dark mushroom
slices, you
know what I’m
talking about. When cultivated mushrooms
are harvested,
they are very firm,
very white, and very tight – meaning
you will not be
able to see the gills
underneath
the lid. As the mush-
room loses its
moisture, the cap shrinks, exposing the
gills.
The mush-
room becomes
flabby, and the texture is unappealing to eat raw
(older
mushrooms
are fine for cooking, though). Store cultivated mushrooms
in a loose
paper bag or in a container with air holes in it. They will
sweat
and
get slimy if
they are kept too tightly wrapped.
Featured
Archive Recipes:
Avocado Spinach Salad with
Lemon-Mustard Vinaigrette
P. J. Clark's Spinach, Mushroom
and Bacon Salad
Spinach, Pear and Green Bean Salad
with Riesling Dressing
Spinach Salad with Salmon
and Artichokes
Spinach and Turkey Salad with
Cucumber and Feta Dressing
Strawberry Spinach
Salad with
Toasted Almonds
Warm
Spinach Salad with
Honey-Mustard Dressing
Wilted Spinach with Smoked Turkey
and Mushrooms
The Essentials!
Index - Salad Recipe Archives
Index - Salad Dressing Recipes
Daily Recipe Index
Recipe Archives Index
Recipe Search
|
