Salade Indochinoise

What do you get when you take a perfectly innocent salade Lyonnaise and Thai it up with a fried egg?  A sinfully good salade Indochinoise*!  Okay, I'm done with the puns.  =P

A couple of days ago I saw this Thai fried egg salad on Food 52 and was really intrigued.  I prefer a runny yolk and no raw onions, though, so I looked to the French for inspiration.  A classic salade Lyonnaise consists of a poached egg with crisp bacon over frisée tossed with a warm vinaigrette.  To combine the two, I decided to make the eggs sunny-side up and add fish sauce, lime juice, and garlic to the hot bacon fat to make the dressing.  So yeah, this is a pretty intense salad.  You have been warned.

Salade Indochinoise

serves 2

2 slices thick cut bacon, cut into lardons

1 1/2 teaspoon Thai fish sauce

1 tablespoon fresh lime juice

1/2 teaspoon cane sugar

1 garlic clove, minced
A small squirt of sriracha

2 large eggs

2 large handfuls salad greens

Add the lardons to a pan and place on medium-low heat.

While the bacon is cooking, combine the fish sauce, lime juice, sugar, minced garlic, and sriracha in a small bowl.

Once the bacon is crisp, remove from the pan and add to the fish sauce mixture.

Crack the two eggs onto the hot pan.  Cook until the egg white are just set.  Carefully remove the sunny-side up eggs onto a plate, keeping as much bacon fat as you can in the pan.

Add the fish sauce mixture back to the hot pan.  Lower the heat and swirl the pan to warm up the dressing.

Toss the dressing and salad greens together and plate.  Slide the eggs on top and serve.

The best part is breaking into the yolk and letting that glorious molten gold spill onto the plate.  Divine!

I used a spring mix that I got in my Boston Organics delivery, but next time I'd probably use a sturdier green like escarole or romaine to hold up against the heat and pungency of the dressing.  And if you like cilantro, tossing a handful in would probably be awesome.

*I guess it would be helpful to know that Indochine is the French word for the peninsula on which Thailand sits.

Next:  Flower Pavlovas
Previously:  Sticky Toffee Pudding Ice Cream
Last Year:  Tartine's Lemon Cream Tart
Four Years Ago:  Gaufres de Leige (Belgian Waffles)
Five Years Ago:  Hua Juan (Steamed Scallion Buns)