The weekend was full of pool time, time with family (including a lunch out with my parents), reading, organizing around the house (something I secretly love), and plenty of relaxation. Ah, summer living… We also had some really good thunderstorms. I love a summer storm. My kiddos have day camps every day this week, and I’m a little excited to have a quiet house to be able to knock out some work. I mean, I love when they are home, too, but they can be a little distracting. And demanding. OK, let’s move on to the food.
Last week I shared this warm bacon vinaigrette that is easy to make with on-hand ingredients in about 15 minutes and will take your salad and vegetables over the top. It’s SO very scrumptious. And so I had to share a salad worthy of that amazing dressing, which is how we have arrived at today’s recipe for this loaded spinach salad with bacon vinaigrette. And when I say loaded, I mean loaded.
This salad has plenty of baby spinach, yes, but then we’re going all out. We’ve got roasted, browned fingerling potatoes. We’ve got sliced hard-boiled eggs and a little bite from some red onion slices. And we’ve got some sliced mushrooms to bring to the party, too. And then we have bacon crumbles over top and that warm bacon vinaigrette to drizzle over the whole shebang. No one is going to have eyes for anything but this salad! So let’s get fixing.
Now, I’ve got some notes and tips coming up below on how to make this loaded spinach salad. Just tryin’ to be helpful. If you want to jump on down to the recipe, simply scroll right on through the rest of the text. The recipe card is near the bottom of the page, above the comments section.
Notes on making loaded spinach salad:
Spinach: Baby spinach works best here, but regular spinach would be OK, too. You could even swap in a mix of spinach and other greens if you’d like. Potatoes: I love the size and flavor of the fingerling potatoes for this salad, but you could also use some small red or white potatoes. Eggs: You’ll need some cooked hard-boiled eggs for this recipe. You can make yours on the stove or make Instant Pot hard boiled eggs. (They peel so easily!) Red onion: I personally love some red onion, raw, cooked, pickled, however. But if you are sensitive to them or yours is especially pungent, slice the red onion and soak the pieces in cold water for about 5-10 minutes. Then drain the water off and use the slices for your salad. Mushrooms: Regular white button mushrooms are perfect, here. You could also try swapping in baby bella mushrooms if you prefer.
Also, I don’t have them listed in the recipe, but walnuts or even candied walnuts would be a great addition to this salad if you have some on hand.
But as you can see, this really is a LOADED salad with the potatoes, eggs and mushrooms to add some serious heft and heartiness. No wimpy salads here, please! (If you love salads like this, you might also want to check out this warm chicken, spinach and sweet potato salad that has a very similar bacon vinaigrette dressing.) As for the bacon vinaigrette that we’re using as a dressing, it’s really easy to throw together. First, cook the bacon in the skillet to get the grease. While that’s going, you can prep the rest of the ingredients. Remove the bacon, keeping 2 tablespoons of the grease in the pan, and then briefly sauté the shallot and garlic before adding the rest of the ingredients and stirring it all together really well. That’s it! It’s ready to use or you can let it hang out on low heat on the stove. You can even make it ahead and let it cool then store it in the refrigerator. It will solidify in the fridge, so just remove it and spoon it into a small skillet to rewarm for a few minutes before using.
And of course, you should definitely crumble all of the reserved bacon from the dressing to use over top of this salad. You’re going to be diving in for forkful after forkful and trying to get ALL of that delicious goodness in your mouth with each bite. Mmm, mmm, good. Last thing… serving it up. As you can see from the photos here, I arranged the salad in different sections to make it pretty and show off the different ingredients. That can be a fun look, or you could mix it all together before serving it. You’ll be doing that on your plate anyway. I’m seriously excited for you to try this salad; I think it’ll knock your socks off. Oh, and if you do make it, please leave a comment below or tag me on Instagram. I love hearing from you! Enjoy! XO, Kathryn
Spinach: Baby spinach works best here, but regular spinach would be OK, too. You could even swap in a mix of spinach and other greens if you’d like. Potatoes: I love the size and flavor of the fingerling potatoes for this salad, but you could also use some small red or white potatoes. Eggs: You’ll need some cooked hard-boiled eggs for this recipe. You can make yours on the stove or make Instant Pot hard boiled eggs. (They peel so easily!) Red onion: I personally love some red onion, raw, cooked, pickled, however. But if you are sensitive to them or yours is especially pungent, slice the red onion and soak the pieces in cold water for about 5-10 minutes. Then drain the water off and use the slices for your salad. Mushrooms: Regular white button mushrooms are perfect, here. You could also try swapping in baby bella mushrooms if you prefer.
