Foodie Friday -- Not Your Mother's Spinach Salad

My nephew was married on the Saturday before Christmas. As family, we were invited to the rehearsal dinner, so we drove two hours to OKC for the rehearsal dinner. And, boy, am I glad we did!

The food was wonderful, but the caterer's spinach salad was what really caught my attention. It wasn't your regular spinach, eggs and bacon salad.

No-Sirree-Bob! It was chocked full of all sorts of goodies. And let me tell you, I could have eaten this stuff with every meal!

In fact, I made this salad for Christmas--much of the prep work could be done the day before. This was the first time we hosted Christmas dinner, and this salad was definitely on the menu!

Chopped Spinach Salad

Chopped spinach
Pearl Couscous
Dried cranberries
pepitas (pumpkin seeds)
sunflower seeds
Bacon

I made this recipe for roughly seven adults, and two small batches were sent home with the families.

Chop two 8-oz packages of spinach into bite-sized pieces. Toss with the other ingredients, as desired, though I will tell you that the heavier ingredients do fall to the bottom. Toss periodically with tongs as the spinach breaks down.

Serve within two hours.

Tips & Tricks:

• Bacon: Chop 1 lb of bacon into small pieces. Cook until crisp, drain the bacon. I used 1/2 the bacon for the spinach salad, the other half for the green beans. I saved the bacon grease to season the green beans, but you can also use to make a vinaigrette. 
• Pearl Couscous: This is also called Israeli couscous. They cook into puffy round pieces of yumminess. I just followed the directions on the package, but only used 1/2 the amount it made. If you are saving this for the next day, add a touch of olive oil to the cooled couscous as the starchiness of the couscous makes it stick together in a clump.
• If you want more seeds, add more seeds. The seeds added a nice crunch, while the cranberries added a sweet/tart that was needed.
• I had a variety of dressings on the side, but thought the Green Goddess dressing was the best on it. If you want to make a bacon vinaigrette, then make it with red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, salt and pepper, and the remaining bacon grease.
• I've been making a version of this salad over the last few days--large containers of pepitas and sunflower seeds, yanno. I take about two cups of spinach leaves, chop them, and place into a small Ziploc storage bag, add the other doodads and one Tbls of dressing--shake well.

Enjoy this quick and easy recipe!

Later, Peeps!

Hopefully, I'll be on a regular blogging schedule in the future!