Bacon and Spinach
Ingredients
Directions
Prepare
Pick over the spinach and cut off the thick ends of the stems.
Wash the spinach well in cold water to remove grit.
Cook
Bring a pot of water to a boil and add a little coarse sea salt and baking soda.
Add the spinach to the boiling water and cook for about 10 minutes.
Serve
Strain the spinach and serve it with the cooked bacon.
Transcribed from a scanned cookbook and modernised for today's kitchens. Where the book gave no heat or time, or said "a moderate oven", the temperatures and times here may be modern equivalents rather than the book's own figures.
Explore the science
What each ingredient does
- Spinach
- Forms the main body of the dish, and its leaves soften into a tender, silky texture when cooked.
- Bacon
- Adds savory, salty flavor and rich fat that coats the cooked spinach.
- Baking soda
- Raises the water's alkalinity, helping the spinach keep a bright green colour during cooking.
The step that matters
Cook the spinach for about 10 minutes in boiling water. Spinach cooks quickly, and overcooking breaks down its cell structure, making it mushy and dulling its green colour. Timing the cook keeps the leaves tender yet intact.
“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.
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