This hearty grilled romaine salad with BLT ingredients delivers a restaurant-worthy experience right in your own kitchen.
A few years back, I did a stint as a wedding photographer with my husband. We photographed weddings across the front range of the Rocky Mountains, in and around Denver, and deep in the mountains at ski resorts and national parks. Wedding photography is fun, and I cherished the opportunity to see all the amazing scenes of Colorado mountain weddings, but it’s admittedly a stressful gig, so it didn’t pan out for me as a long-term career. But there is one part of the job that I miss: the food.
A wedding photographer’s lunch break is typically phenomenal. I ate so many delicious catered meals over the five years I was a photographer, and our clients were usually very generous with the desserts, too (which I always accepted graciously). But there’s one meal that stands out among all the wonderful culinary experiences I had at weddings, and that was the grilled romaine Caesar salad. It was just an appetizer, but it changed how I looked at salads forever. I came home from that wedding deeply inspired and began tinkering with grilling my own hearts of romaine.
This BLT grilled romaine salad is a dream on a plate. If you’ve never had a grilled romaine salad, get ready for a party of textures and grill flavors! We’re using turkey bacon in this recipe, which gives you a similar salty, smoky flavor as regular bacon with less fat, and the homemade vinaigrette is tangy and garlicky with a sweetness from the honey. Oh, guys, it’s perfect. You’ll want to eat it every day, and your brain is going to explode with ideas about grilling delicate greens. Just don’t go overboard with that idea—not every salad green holds up to grilling like romaine does.
Is This BLT Grilled Romaine Wedge Salad With Lemon Vinaigrette Healthy?
This salad is fairly healthy! The turkey bacon adds protein without the high fat content of regular pork bacon. Romaine lettuce provides plenty of vitamins and minerals, such as folate, vitamins C and K, and potassium, and it’s low in calories and fat. Boiled eggs provide a nice dose of protein, along with essential nutrients like choline. There is a good bit of fat in this recipe, but most of the fat content is the healthy unsaturated type, thanks to the olive oil.
Overall, this grilled romaine salad is a healthy choice for people on low-carb diets, and it’s also dairy-free and gluten-free. If you’re following a keto diet, you can make this salad even lower in carbs by substituting the honey for a keto sweetener, such as erythritol or stevia.
Additions To Your Grilled BLT Salad
If you’re a big salad fan, you know there are infinite ways to make a salad. That’s the case with a grilled salad, too. The BLT theme gives us some guidelines with this recipe, but the recipe also takes some liberties (for example, I don’t often see eggs on BLTs, but they’re delicious on this salad). In the spirit of liberties, here are some of my favorite additions to this practically perfect salad recipe.
- Use pork bacon: If you don’t have any sodium or pork restrictions, and you have some regular bacon lying around, go ahead and use it instead of turkey bacon. Not only is it saltier, but it adds a lusciousness to this salad (because of the excess fat, no doubt) that I simply adore.
- Add cheese: The right cheese on a salad is very important in my mind. This salad, to me, screams for blue cheese. I know blue cheese is a polarizing ingredient, so perhaps you’d rather feta, queso fresco, or fresh goat cheese on your version.
- Add onions: Raw onions on a salad are practically gospel to me. Diced red onion, chopped green onion, or even some regular chopped yellow onions will do the trick here.
How Do I Store Leftovers?
Grilled romaine salads are definitely best eaten fresh, but if you end up with leftover portions, store them in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 2 or 3 days. The quicker you eat it, the better it’ll be! And, like most lettuce-based salads, don’t freeze leftovers. You’d end up with a soggy dish.
Serving Suggestions
To make this salad a little more substantial, I would serve this salad alongside (not as an appetizer, but as an accompaniment!) a light meal, such as a bowl of Cilantro-Lime Brown Rice with Juicy Grilled Chicken Breast on top. You could also serve it with something even simpler, like these Quick Baked Potatoes with any toppings you like.
If you’re eating light with just this salad for dinner, you might as well make a little dessert to follow it up. I love this Healthy Frozen Strawberry Dessert personally, but if you’re a fan of chocolate, feel free to whip up a batch of this lovely Chocolate Pudding.
Ingredients
For The Vinaigrette:
- ¼ cup fresh lemon juice from about 1 large lemon
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic
- 1 tablespoon fresh minced dill packed, plus extra for garnish
- 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
- 2 teaspoons honey
- ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
- Salt and pepper to taste
For The Salad:
- 4 large eggs
- 4 romaine hearts
- 4 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 8 strips turkey bacon
- 1⅓ cups cherry tomatoes quartered
Instructions
- In a small food processor, combine the fresh lemon juice, garlic, dill, Dijon mustard, and honey. Process until well combined. With the food processor running, stream in the olive oil until the vinaigrette thickens and lightens in color. Season to taste with salt and pepper and set aside.
- Preheat your grill to medium-high heat.
- While the grill heats, place the eggs in a large pot and almost cover with water. Bring them to a boil. Once boiling, time them for 4 minutes. After that, drain the water and cover the eggs with cold water. Set aside.
- Chop the very tip of the romaine stems off, making sure to leave enough stem to keep the leaves together. A few leaves may fall off, which is okay. Brush the outside of each romaine heart with 1 teaspoon of olive oil, and place on the grill. Cook, turning occasionally, until lightly charred, about 5 minutes. Remove from heat and let cool.
- While the lettuce cools, place the turkey bacon on the grill. Cook until crispy and there are clear grill marks, about 2 minutes. Once cooked, crumble the strips.
- Place each romaine heart on a plate and divide the crumbled turkey bacon strips and tomatoes on top. Peel the boiled eggs. Drizzle each heart with 1½ tablespoons of the vinaigrette, and then place a peeled egg on the center.
- Garnish with a bit more fresh dill and serve.
Nutrition Info:
Nutrition information are estimates only and may vary based on the specific brands, ingredients, and portion sizes you use. This data is provided for informational purposes only.
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