roasted fig salad
Nothing is more appealing to me in the summer time than salads. It wasn’t always that way, really the salad craving started when I was pregnant with Grace. I was one of those weird pregnant women who really didn’t crave junk food. I got lucky like that I suppose. Most of my friends were all about the processed sugars, but sugar has never really been my thing. What I craved when I was pregnant was salads and mangos. Like the fresher the food the better. I distinctly remember driving 30 minutes to this one joint down the road from us all because it had this amazing salad that had fresh jicama on it. Damn I still love that salad…
So when I start to see all the summer fruits and salads and stuff coming out in the stores, I totally do an internal happy dance. I can easily turn a salad with the proper amount of healthy protein into a full meal and gladly do that on the regular during the summer months.
Naturally when I figured out what I was doing with figs, I started thinking about how to incorporate them into my food on a more consistent basis. A treat for me for sure is a roasted fig with some bacon, or some goat cheese and drizzled with honey (paired with some awesome wine of course). But I needed a recipe that would act more as a side and less as an appetizer.
As most of my recipes go, this was another happy accident that resulted from me not wanting the food in my fridge to spoil. I had blueberries and arugula that were on the verge of being a bit too old, so I thought (as I do with all my great decisions) fuck it, this’ll work or it won’t and no one will ever know it happened.
I already had leftover Roasted Figs from my previous recipe experiment, so really it was just a matter of cooking the bacon. Why bacon? I wanted something in the salad that would add a source of saltiness to counteract the sweetness of the fruit as well as the spice of the arugula. Since Costco nailed it with bacon that’s already cooked and only needs to be reheated, bacon seemed like the natural solution.
Then everything just landed into a bowl and side salad was served. I will say that I would totally use this as a full meal, but I would add in an additional protein source, like grilled chicken and more avocado because avocado is delicious and I can never have enough.
roasted fig salad
Prep time: 15 minutes
Cook time: 15 to 20 minutes
Serves: 4 people
4 slices of bacon, cooked and crumbled
4 cups of arugula, rinsed
1/2 avocado, diced
1/2 cup blueberries, rinse
1/2 cup roasted figs, diced
2 green onions, diced
1/4 cup slivered almonds
1/4 cup balsamic vinaigrette (more or less depending on your taste)
Grab your big salad bowl, add all the ingredients into the bowl and toss until the dressing is evenly distributed! Serve immediately!
If you want to turn this into a meal, add in some grilled chicken!
