A New Kind Of Potato Salad

 As a treat for James I reached down into our potato hills to dig up a couple fresh spuds for dinner.
I wanted a recipe to feature those tubers and show off the plentiful greens growing in our vegetable beds. As luck would have it I came across a recipe from one of my favorite chefs, Suzanne Goin, for a warm potato, frisée and dandelion salad. Now we've got plenty of dandelions but no frisée so I substituted some young kale, a few handfuls of oak leaf lettuce growing nearby and a bit of basil along with the cup of parsley leaves the chef calls for.
Goin's recipe couldn't be simpler. I tossed the potatoes with olive oil, thyme and salt and set them in a 400º oven (covered with foil) for 40 minutes. As the potatoes cooled for about 10 minutes I started cooking bacon (cut in 1/2" pieces) in a skillet. When the bacon was golden brown I added in a sliced onion and the potatoes cut into big (bigger than a mouthful) pieces. Goin uses beautiful fingerling potatoes but we don't have any of those ready to harvest so I went for the yukon golds and purple vikings ready to pull. After two minutes I tossed in a mixture of 3TB sherry vinegar and 2 TB of olive oil (I actually doubled it since we had such a big bowl of greens) and let everything heat through. I poured the warm dressing over the waiting mixed greens and tossed everything together, wilting the greens and spreading the bacony goodness through the salad.
"I like dinners like this," James declared between bites.
Three of his favorite things (potatoes, bacon, bitter greens) in one bowl. I'll be making this one again.