With varying textures and flavors like crispy bacon, juicy strawberries, crunchy lettuce, and creamy blue cheese, there’s so much to love about this simple strawberry bacon salad. It’s perfect for entertaining, but also makes a light lunch or dinner.
Tell Me About This Strawberry Bacon Salad
- Texture: While we love the strawberries and pops of creaminess from the cheese, this salad is all about crunch courtesy of the romaine lettuce, bacon, and pecans.
- Flavor: We’re amazed by the amount of flavor packed into a salad that calls for just 5 ingredients: sweet, savory, sharp, and nutty. The honey balsamic vinaigrette is the perfect finishing touch, bringing all these wonderful flavors together.
- Ease: Salads are usually pretty easy to throw together and this one is no exception—just chop, toss, and serve.
- Time: If you don’t have cooked bacon, set aside some time to cook it first. We usually use the stovetop for bacon. After that, the salad takes about 15 minutes to throw together.
Suggestions for Serving this Strawberry Bacon Salad
This salad is our usual go-to for entertaining, such as alongside Christmas dinner, at bridal showers, baby showers, or really anytime you need a guaranteed delicious (and easy!) dish. It’s also a favorite savory option when planning our menu of Easter brunch recipes.
When we make it for dinner, we usually add something substantial like grilled chicken or salmon. We’ve also added 1/2 cup of chopped red onion or chickpeas and/or 1 sliced avocado for extra flavor and texture. Sometimes we arrange hard-boiled eggs on top like a cobb salad, too.
When preparing the strawberry bacon salad as a side dish, we often serve it with baked macaroni and cheese, corn fritters, crab cakes, or baked lemon herb salmon.
Some Notes on the Ingredients
- Strawberries. Use the juiciest strawberries you can find—they make an even more flavorful salad.
- Nuts. We love pecans, but chopped walnuts or sliced almonds are great options too.
- Blue cheese. Blue cheese (bleu cheese)—you either love it or you hate it. Sure, it won’t win any beauty awards and its scent is undoubtedly suspicious, but its bold flavor is one of the best parts of this salad especially when paired with sweet strawberries and honey balsamic vinaigrette. If blue cheese just isn’t your thing, you have options! Either feta cheese or goat cheese (like I use in this maple-roasted squash kale salad) work too.
- Honey balsamic vinaigrette. What we love most about this strawberry bacon salad is the homemade vinaigrette. We typically see this salad with a poppy seed dressing of sorts, but the honey balsamic vinaigrette takes it to an entirely new level. It’s very easy to make and you can shake it up ahead of time.
PS: If you have leftover bacon and a furry friend at home, try my homemade bacon dog treats!
More Savory Recipes You’ll Love
- Strawberry Feta Pasta Salad & Creamy Chicken Pasta Salad
- Zucchini Casserole
- Citrus Chicken Quinoa Salad
- Green Bean Casserole
- Honey Garlic Shrimp
For even more inspiration here are 15+ summer dinner ideas!
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My Favorite Strawberry Bacon Salad
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 0 minutes
- Total Time: 15 minutes
- Yield: serves 4
- Category: Salad
- Method: Cooking
- Cuisine: American
Description
This is our favorite strawberry bacon salad because it’s always a crowd-pleaser and if you already have cooked bacon, it takes about 15 minutes to throw together.
Ingredients
- 8 cups chopped romaine lettuce
- 1 pound strawberries, sliced
- 5–6 slices bacon, cooked and chopped
- 2/3 cup crumbled blue cheese*
- 2/3 cup chopped pecans*
Honey Balsamic Vinaigrette
- 1/4 cup extra virgin olive oil
- 2 Tablespoons balsamic vinegar
- 2 Tablespoon honey
- 1 teaspoon dijon mustard
- salt & freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Make the vinaigrette first by whisking all of the vinaigrette ingredients together. Taste, then add salt and pepper as needed. You can make the dressing ahead of time and keep it in the refrigerator until ready to use. It’s great for up to 2 weeks when stored in the refrigerator.
- If your bacon is not already cooked, cook it according to its package directions. Cool until ready to handle, then chop it up.
- In a large bowl, toss all of the salad ingredients together, then mix in the vinaigrette. You may not need all the vinaigrette—use as much or little as you prefer.
- Plate and serve. Cover and store leftovers in the refrigerator for up to 2 days.
Notes
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowls | Whisk
- Lettuce: Instead of romaine, this salad is wonderful with spinach or mixed field greens too.
- Cheese: Instead of blue cheese, try feta or goat cheese.
- Pecans: If you have some extra time, toast the pecans for added flavor. Preheat oven to 300°F (150°C). Line a large baking sheet with parchment paper or a silicone baking mat. Spread pecans on top and toast for 7-8 minutes. Cool before adding to salad. Feel free to substitute with chopped walnuts or sliced almonds. (And you can toast those following the same toasting directions.)
This sounds delicious, but I don’t have balsamic vinegar right now. I do have raspberry vinegar which sounds good, but I am worried about it with the Dijon. Any thoughts?
Hi Carrie, that sounds good, I would try it!
This is a great salad. It’s now one of my favorites. I’ve eaten it, with slight variations, and adding some protein, almost every night for the last two weeks. It’s simple and fast to put together, and it’s incredibly flexible. Whatever you don’t have — switch it for something else. Don’t like blue cheese? Feta works great. Don’t have pecans? Walnuts are very tasty. Loving adding strawberries to my salad, and adding protein makes it a dinner. We always cook several proteins ahead and freeze them in 4 oz. portions, so I just pull out a package, thaw it, and add it to the salad. Any protein will complement the great flavors of this salad. Thank you for another winner. 🙂
Made this yesterday for Easter dinner. What a hit! So good. Now it will be my favorite summer salad!
Please include nutrition information
Hi Susan, We don’t usually include nutrition information as it can vary between different brands of the same ingredients. Plus, many recipes have ingredient substitutions or optional ingredients listed. However, there are many handy online calculators where you can plug in and customize your exact ingredients/brands. Readers have found this one especially helpful: https://www.verywellfit.com/recipe-nutrition-analyzer-4157076
What is your opinion on silicone vs metal bakeware Your mini quiche sounds divine
Hi Vic, We use metal pans for just about all of our baking. We don’t have much experience with using silicone pans.
This recipe gives you a lot of bang for your buck (by buck I mean effort). The recipe, while simple to make, is delicious. I served it with artisan bread (recipe under Bread link), and a glass of red wine. My wife is already asking when I am going to make this again. A++
I adore this salad. I’ve made it many times during the summer and it’s a favorite. I love it so much, I want to serve it for Thanksgiving. Any thoughts on how to give it a more fall/holiday feel? Apples, pears, or pomegranates instead of strawberries? I saw your recipe for sugared cranberries and thought it might be a fun addition…
Hi Sophia, any of those fruits would be delicious here! Please do let us know what you try.
We loved this so much! I was a bit worried I wouldn’t love the dressing because it wasn’t something I’d had before and I can be a bit picky but it was delicious! I already can’t wait to have it again!
Can Balsamic Vinegar be substituted with another product for the strawberry bacon salad dressing?
Hi Rita, You can use red wine vinegar mixed with maple syrup for a similar flavor, or you can use any salad dressing you prefer instead of this one.
Love how simple this salad is! Made it with white cheddar instead of blue cheese for a party since I didn’t know if people there liked blue cheese. It was such a hit, it was gone before I could even get any! Everyone told me it was delicious haha. I plan on making it again so I can have some!
This salad is excellent! I used green leaf lettuce from our CSA and used feta instead of blue cheese because it’s what I had on hand. I stacked the leftovers in a mason jar with the dressing on the bottom, then the berries and other toppings, and the lettuce on top. It will be delicious for lunch at work tomorrow! The dressing is a highlight and would go really well on any salad.
Hi Sally,
Very Yummy. My Husband and I love this salad. I’m always looking for new ways to use strawberries and I love them in salad. I made this exactly the way the recipe is but I did add some onions. I will be making this again. I have been using your website for several months now and everything I make has been so good. Thank you for the recipes.
Hi, Sally!
What a Godsend your recipe is! I don’t have enough ranch (or croutons) to make my regular salad. And I have my wonderful facon (vegetarian bacon) in the freezer. It’s peak strawberry season right now where I am at (Tampa area) and I need to use the strawberries in something yummy that’s not a dessert. Thank you!
Made this salad a few weeks ago. It was delicious and filling!
Is there another cheese you can recommend, we don’t love blue cheese in our house.. or strong cheeses? thank you
Feta cheese would be great, but that’s particularly strong. How about white cheddar?
I LOVE this salad. The things I do differently–use feta cheese since I don’t care for the blue, use candied pecans & use strawberry vinaigrette. Along with your Strawberry cupcakes with strawberry buttercream, I’m in Strawberry heaven!!!
This salad was so good! Amazing how a few ingredients can taste so great. We have flavored balsamic vinegars that we get from a local source, and I used the pomegranate balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt and pepper and it was really good and a little quicker to prepare. THanks for the idea – this was a perfect dinner after a long day!
I absolutely LOVE this salad – have already made it a several times in the last two weeks. I make it with baby arugula, which balances the sweet of the strawberries, pecans, and dressing.
Sally, this is my first post but not my first recipe. I have been reading your site and making your recipes for the past three months — you have single handedly turned me into a person who looks forward to cooking and baking for myself and others! Thank you for sharing outstanding recipes that I can both learn from and depend on!
This was absolutely delicious! I made it today with fresh strawberries and mizuna in place of the lettuce because it was in our CSA basket this week. My husband and I loved it! He said it was the best thing he ever ate. I used Parmesan because we had it on hand and I don’t like blue cheese. Amazing! Love your recipes for baking – my go to for many treats. Thanks for sharing your talents!
We had this tonight since it was still about 93 degrees at dinner time. It was so yummy! I did use Feta instead of Blue cheese since we’re not really fans. We also added avocado slices and used honey roasted pecans and the real bacon pieces that you can get at Costco (I just crisp them up in a frying pan over medium-high heat for a few minutes). Thank you so much for such a delicious dinner! 🙂
I just made this salad for lunch, devoured it, and pronounce it DELICIOUS! The dressing is especially tasty, simple to whisk up and will serve me well on other salads that I make.
Thank you!