modified salade lyonnaise
This elegant salad hails from Lyon, France, and I’m a little surprised you don’t find it in more restaurants here on this continent. It’s a salad, but come on, it has bacon AND an egg in it. If this can’t get Americans to eat their vegetables, I’m giving up hope. (Please note that I am not actually advocating eating bacon and eggs with every serving of vegetables. Also I’m not actually giving up hope.) The traditional version uses frisée, which is a frizzy bitter green from the chicory genus that you’ve probably seen somewhere in a mesclun salad mix. But you could use any kind of bitter salad green, including escarole and arugula, as Mark Bittman advises. Lardons (little French cross-section batons of thick-sliced bacon) are also traditionally used, but I went with pancetta since there was some sitting around in the freezer. Finally, I find poaching eggs to be an unnecessarily fussy way to spend my time, so I went with sunny-side-up and only used one frying pan for everything.
To make the dressing, combine a little bit of Dijon mustard with a little bit of sherry vinegar, salt, pepper, and oil. Fry bacon pieces in a pan until crisp. Remove. To make croutons, add a clove or two of chopped garlic to the bacon fat and push it around to infuse the grease. Remove garlic from the pan. Add stale bread cubes (I had some leftover from Thanksgiving stuffing-making) and cook, tossing occasionally, until crisp and golden. Season with a little bit of salt and pepper. Wipe crumbs from the pan and add a little butter or oil. Cook an egg in it, but not too much because you want to smother this whole salad in hot runny yolk. Of course, you can also just go ahead and poach the egg like you’re supposed to. Toss dressing with frisée, bacon pieces, and croutons. Top with egg. Devour.
