Got room for one more fall recipe?
Say hello to my little giant friend, the Autumn Chopped Salad!
Chopped salads are big, entree-sized salads where all the ingredients have been, you guessed it, chopped into bite-sized pieces, then tossed with dressing until every morsel is uniformly coated and ready to be shoveled into your face. I mean, eaten. Delicately, eaten.
Autumn Chopped Salad is a chopped salad that contains all the ingredients that make autumn wonderful, including sweet pears, crisp apples, crunchy roasted peanuts, chewy dried cranberries, and bacon. I suppose bacon isn’t inherently autumnal (love that word,) but hello, it’s bacon. Do we need an excuse to throw it into a salad? The answer is no. No. We. Don’t!
You may have seen the recipe for Autumn Chopped Salad from the doll that is Madison of Espresso & Cream floating around Pinterest for the past couple of years – and for good reason. The toppings-to-lettuce ratio is off the charts (a MUST for any entree-sized salad,) and the combo of sweet and salty is so satisfying. Plus, I repeat, there’s bacon. You will love this quick and filling salad recipe!
Start the Autumn Chopped Salad by adding 6 cups chopped romaine lettuce in a big bowl. A VERY BIG BOWL. The biggest one you’ve got!
Then microwave 3 slices center-cut bacon until crisp. Here’s my muss/fuss-free way to microwave bacon with perfect results every time:
Lay bacon strips on a folded paper towel on a microwave-safe plate, then cover with another folded paper towel. Microwave for 1 minute then rotate the plate 1/4 turn and microwave for 30 more seconds. Continue rotating and cooking in 30 second increments until the bacon is nice and crisp, about 2-3 minutes, then let it cool and chop it up. Done!
While the bacon’s cooling, start chopping the rest of the autumnal (there’s that word again!) toppings for the salad, including 1 pear. Whatever variety is your fave – bartlett, bosch, asian, etc. – is perfect.
Next chop up 1 apple. This here is an organic Pink Lady. A juicy Honeycrisp would be the ULTIMATE, but they’re still $3.99/lb around here which I’m not desperate enough to pay…yet.
To the lettuce, pear, and apple, add 1/4 cup each dried cranberries, chopped peanuts, and crumbled feta cheese.
Toss in the slightly cooled bacon, then it’s time to get dressed!
Madison recommends dressing the salad in a mixture of poppy seed salad dressing and balsamic vinaigrette, which I thought was brilliant – I always forget about PSD! I didn’t have any balsamic vinaigrette in the house, so I just threw a shot of balsamic vinegar into the mix, and it turned out awesome.
Give the salad a thorough toss to coat every bite in the dressing mixture (this is where having a BIG bowl comes in handy!) then divide between 2 big plates and shovel enjoy. :)
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Autumn Chopped Salad
Description
Autumn Chopped Salad highlights delicious fall flavors like pears, apples, roasted peanuts, and dried cranberries.
Ingredients
- 6 cups chopped romaine lettuce
- 3 slices center-cut bacon
- 1 pear, chopped
- 1 apple, chopped
- 1/4 cup peanuts, chopped
- 1/4 cup dried cranberries
- 1/4 cup crumbled feta cheese
- 1/4 cup Poppy Seed Salad Dressing (or more or less)
- 2 Tablespoons balsamic vinegar (or more or less)
Directions
- Lay bacon strips down on a folded paper towel on a microwave-safe plate, then cover with another folded paper towel. Microwave for 1 minute then rotate the plate 1/4 turn and microwave for 30 more seconds. Continue rotating and cooking in 30 second increments until the bacon is crisp, then let cool and chop up.
- Add cooled bacon, romaine lettuce, pear, apple, peanuts, dried cranberries, and feta cheese into a very large bowl, then add salad dressing and balsamic vinegar to taste. Toss well then serve immediately.
Notes
Barely adapted from Espresso & Cream
This recipe is courtesy of Iowa Girl Eats, http://iowagirleats.com.
A feast for the eyes, and the stomach! Ben and I licked our bowls clean when I made this for dinner the other night, although we both had different ways of getting there…
Ben eats all his toppings first then uses the lettuce to “fill in the cracks”, while I prefer to eat all the lettuce first and save all the yummy toppings for “dessert”. To each their own, I suppose. Either way, enjoy!
I will be eating this asap. Nothing is better than a salad with 3 times more toppings than lettuce. But who are we kidding, you had me at bacon. Thanks!
This definately looks like my kind of salad! I love the use of the word Autumnal too! Fall just doesn’t cut it I think. Autumn just sounds so much more…cozy!
Also, that Bryanna’s Poppy Seed dressing is my mothers Favourite, she has it on everything! We can’t really get it in the UK, so my dad imports boxes of the stuff!! She once had to trek half a mile down their lane in the snow, and cart the heavy box back up the hill, because the posman couldn’t make it up their lane! Now that’s a serious love for salad dressing!
omg I love that story! Go Mom!
I got to try this salad and fast now that they are saying there is a shortage of bacon!
Ahh, I know! Relieved I got a package while I still can! ;)
I am waiting for honeycrisp to go on sale too! I’m thinking I need to talk to Hyvee about it.
And I agree on the cooking bacon in the microwave – I never pan fry it.
This looks super tasty. My favorite part of a salad is the last few bites, where a little bit of everything has sort of crumbled at the bottom of the bowl so each bite has a morsel of each individual flavor. But getting the majority of the lettuce out of the way first is a MUST.
My pocketbook reeeeally wishes you hadn’t told me about the autumnal fun at Target…
you haven’t posted any pics of yourself, or anything about the delicious fall brews that are out. are you expecting?!?!?!?
Haha, no I’m not! I just posted about having my first pumpkin beer of the season on Sunday! :) http://iowagirleats.com/2012/09/23/50-fall-recipes/
I stocked up on honeycrisps last week when Fareway had em on sale for $1.99! I was so excited!
This salad is right up my alley! All my favorite things!
This looks almost like our dinner last night! I didn’t have pear, used turkey bacon and crumbled bleu cheese, and a honey/balsamic dressing I made myself. We both had giant plates but it was so good–and good for us!
I just had Panera’s Roasted Turkey Harvest Salad yesterday and thought to myself, “I could totally recreate this at home 10x better.” I think you did just that! :) Looks perfect!
Have you had the chicken chopped salad at Redstone when you have been to MN? SO YUMMY! Your salad looks very similar.
Oh buddy I make something like this where I work and add grilled turkey breast and brie. So YUM and perfect for fall!
Love love love huge salads! This one looks great!
Love all of the beautiful Fall inspired photos! This salad looks like a burst of Fall for the mouth….yum!
I’ve been sick and appetite-less since this weekend, and this photo just made my mouth water and stomach grumble. I can’t wait to try it! It looks perfectly like fall
I’ve never understood the Honeycrisp pricing trends. When I was in Minneapolis, they regularly cost $3.99/lb and MN *grows* apples for crying out loud. Now I live in Colorado, with nary an apple tree in sight and they’re $2.29/lb. So weird.
yummy! I used to eat salad with cranberries and feta cheese on top all the time! This way sounds sooooo much better! PIN! (:
Am serving this up at my next mom’s lunch…For sure. Looks AMAZING! I’m sad I have to wait a week. Maybe I better try it out first. :)
This looks amazing. Will definitely be trying!
Like always, love this recipe! I am in awe of your recipe talent. I mentioned you own my own blog for your talent in food photography! I wish I had your talent! http://www.myownbalance.com/2012/09/21/end-of-summer-light-cooking/
Thanks so much, Britt!
I eat the salads the same way you do – save the best parts for last. :-)