Photo: Claire Lower
Salad is a breakfast food, of this I am certain. Eggs, bacon, and toasted bread (croutons) are all comfortable amongst a pile of greens, but you can make them even more at home with a breakfast-y vinaigrette. Using maple syrup as your sweetener can help, but for true early morning authenticity, I recommend Mrs. Butterworth’s.
Please do not yell at me. If I’m eating pancakes or waffles, I will choose real maple syrup every time. But maple, as a flavor, is a little slutty. It’s not just for breakfast, and is used in all sorts of savory dishes, from BBQ to roasted vegetables. Mrs. Butterworth is a more monogamous sort of woman, and it’s hard to separate her flavor from the very concept of breakfast. If you were to toss her with some roasted carrots, they would become breakfast carrots.
She also blends beautifully into a vinaigrette. She’s sweet for sure, and a little toasty and (obviously) buttery, and those flavors play well with fat and acid.
The remaining vinaigrette ingredients are similarly themed. Bacon grease makes up the bulk of the oil (a little veg oil is included to keep things liquid), while Meyer lemon acts as the acid and brings a gentler, tangerine-flecked flavor that’s well suited to the morning meal. A touch of Dijon helps emulsify (and tastes pretty good with eggs), and a spoonful of bacon bits really hammers the point home. It’s delicious, and you should make it immediately.
Mrs. Butterworth’s Breakfast Vinaigrette:
Ingredients:
2 tablespoons Meyer lemon juice (conventional lemons also work)2 tablespoons bacon grease, warmed to melt1 tablespoon vegetable oil1 tablespoon + 1 teaspoon Mrs. Butterworth’s pancake syrup1 tablespoon finely chopped bacon bits1 teaspoon Dijon mustardPinch of saltAdd everything to a jar with a lid and shake like hell. Once emulsified, build your breakfast salad and drizzle it with the resulting dressing. Repeat often to start your day on a smug, healthy-ish note.
