Salad with Baked Potatoes & Zucchini

Salads are a great and fun opportunity to play around with ingredients and create a blend of all your favorite flavors. I am never fully happy with the salads they serve in restaurants. It is always too much lettuce, too much sauce and too little other content. That is why I decided to create my own “perfect salad”.
It was a process of trial and error and this salad turned out to be an ideal match for me. Of course this is a very personal matter and that is why I encourage everyone to create their own “perfect salad”.

U need (serves 2-3)

5 medium sized potatoes (nice looking young potatoes preferably)

Rosemary (about 2 stems)

1 zucchini (if very small, use 2)

A handful of chopped parsley

5 finely chopped cloves of garlic

A handful of roughly chopped dried tomatoes

A handful of roasted pine nuts

About 10 thin strips of bacon

Parmesan cheese

Mix of green salads (any you like)

Balsamic dressing (balsamic vinegar, olive oil, salt)

Olive oil

Sea salt

How to make it

Before you start, remember that ingredients do not need to be hot or even warm, so just take your time to prepare them all and do not worry that the potatoes or zucchini are getting cold. This is a stress-free salad :-)

Read the entire recipe first and decide for yourself in what order you want to prepare the different elements of the salad.

I suggest you start with the potatoes. Wash them thoroughly (leave the skins on!) and cut them into bite-size pieces (I cut my medium-sized potatoes into six pieces each). Boil the potatoes or, preferably, steam them if you have a steam pan, until they are soft, but not falling apart. Then put the potatoes in a baking tin, pour some olive oil on them, sprinkle them with sea salt and add the rosemary. Mix everything well, preferably with your hands. Put them in the oven at about 180 °C for about 15-20 minutes (until the skin is nice and crunchy).

While the potatoes are baking, wash the zucchini and cut them into thin slices (about ½ cm). Chop up the garlic and parsley very finely. Heat up about 5-6 spoons of olive oil in a pan (this needs to be a sauté pan with a lid) and add the zucchini, give it all a good stir, close the lid and let it simmer for about 10 minutes on a low fire. If it is not moist enough, it can start burning. If this is the case, add a little bit of water. After ten minutes, add the garlic, the parsley and some sea salt. Give it another stir, close the lid and let it simmer for another 5-10 minutes, stirring every now and then.

Put the bacon strips on a baking tray (using baking paper) and put them in the oven for about ten minutes (until the fat has melted and they are nice and crispy). You can bake the bacon simultaneously with the potatoes.

Roast the pine nuts on a frying pan with a few drops of olive oil. This will take about a minute. Roughly chop up the dried tomatoes.

Now that all the ingredients are ready, put the lettuce in a large bowl and add the dried tomatoes and the (preferably cooled down) potatoes and zucchini. If the potatoes or zucchini are too hot, the salad will lose its crunch and freshness. Taste the salad and if necessary add the dressing. This might not be needed, since the potatoes and zucchini have plenty of salt and olive oil in them already. So maybe just add some balsamic vinegar. Serve the salad onto plates and sprinkle it with the roasted pine nuts and some flakes of parmesan cheese. Add the bacons strips on top.

 :-)

Imagine this with a fresh ciabatta and some homemade garlic butter….mmmmm :-)