Bacon Pea Salad

This easy Bacon Easy Pea Salad is loaded with peas, bacon, and cheese. It’s the perfect salad or side dish with any meal.

My Mom used to make a pea salad that had peas, cheese, onions, and mayo. I’m not saying it wasn’t good but it just wasn’t too exciting. So I took her base ingredients, minus the onions because I don’t like raw onions, and made my version of Bacon Pea Salad. And I can tell you, it’s far from boring and it’s a big hit at my house. 

ingredient in my easy bacon pea salad

• PEAS – I used frozen peas that I thawed on the countertop for a couple of hours. You can use any type of peas you’d like, even canned peas would work for this recipe. 
• CHEESE – If you read many of my recipes that have cheese as one of the main ingredients, you know I always say, “don’t skimp on the cheese – buy good cheese”. I used a block of medium cheddar that I got from the deli, then I cut it into small pieces for the salad. I often buy a block of cheese from the deli and cut it myself, especially if I am going to dice it or shred it for a recipe. It’s fresh and you can pick the brand you like. For this recipe, you can certainly use pre-cut cheese, but I would not recommend using shredded cheese because you want nice chunky pieces of cheese in every forkful.
• PECANS – I buy nuts in bulk during the holiday season because I seem to cook and bake with them a lot. We also are big on having nuts as snacks. I store my nuts in airtight mason jars in my refrigerator so they stay fresh. You can store most nuts this way for up to nine months. You can also freeze nuts for up to two years in the freezer. 
• BACON – Next to the peas and cheese, bacon is the star of this dish. I used 10 slices of very crispy bacon for this recipe. I only buy and use center-cut bacon and I like my bacon very crispy. When I order bacon at a restaurant, I always order it extra crispy. Keep scrolling to see how I make extra crispy bacon in the oven.
• CELERY – Celery is another vegetable that I am pretty picky about. There is nothing worse than a dried-out stalk of celery. I always use celery hearts when I’m adding it to salads or serving it with dip. If I am adding the celery to a dish that’s being cooked or baked, I use regular stalks of celery.
• DRESSING – You could use a store-bought dressing like ranch or Cesar for this dish, but I like the dressing combination that I used. It’s made with mayo, a little sugar, mustard, vinegar, and salt and pepper. It’s a little tangy with a hint of sweetness that brings out the flavors of all the other ingredients. 

perfect crispy bacon every time

It’s easy to make perfect crispy bacon every time in your oven. I learned this trick from a colleague of mine. I’m not sure how we got on the topic of making bacon but it certainly turned out to be a good bacon-cooking tip. 

1. Preheat the oven to 375°
2. Crumple 1 or 2 pieces of aluminum foil into a ball. 
3. Open the ball of aluminum foil and spread it on a large cookie sheet.
4. Lay the bacon side-by-side on the cookie sheet. 
5. Bake for 25-35 minutes. I’m giving you of time range because every oven is different so you’ll want to check it at 25 minutes and if it’s not crispy enough, let it cook a bit longer. 
6. Make sure the bacon is cooled before you cut it for the salad. It should break into pieces when you start to cut it. 

storing bacon pea salad

This salad will last 4-5 days in your refrigerator. Simply cover it with plastic wrap or place it in a plastic container with a lid. 

other salad recipes you might like

1. Bow Tie Pasta and Spinach Salad
2. Brussels Sprouts Salad
3. Grilled Peach Chicken Salad
4. Greek Chicken Salad
5. Tortellini Spinach Pasta Salad
6. Bourbon Glazed Salmon Cesar Salad
7. Melon Ball Proscuitto Salad

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