Potato Salad with Apples and Bacon

Ingredients
5 thick strips bacon
1 large red or yellow onion, chopped
Salt
2 Golden Delicious apples, peeled, cored, and cut in 1/2-inch dice
1.3kg waxy potatoes, diced
4 shallots, thinly sliced
1/2 cup olive oil
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/4 cup Dijon mustard
1 tbsp chopped fresh thyme
1 1/2 teaspoons pepper


Combine the potatoes and enough cold water to cover by a couple of inches in a large saucepan. Add a generous pinch of salt. Bring to a boil, lower the heat, and cover the pan. Simmer for 15 minutes or until the potatoes are tender when pierced with a fork. Drain well.

While the potatoes are cooking, cook the bacon over medium heat. Once cooked, remove the bacon to a plate lined with paper towels. Reserve the bacon fat in the pan. Once the bacon is cool, chop it.

Cook the onion in the fat in the pan on medium heat, until softened and just starting to brown, about 5 minutes. Remove the onion from the pan to a large bowl and set aside. Add the chopped apple to the bowl.

Add the potatoes and chopped bacon to the onions and apple. Add the green onions, olive oil, vinegar, mustard, and thyme. Salt and pepper to taste.

Can be served warm, room temperature, or cold. Serves 8.

From Simply Recipes

Spicy eggplant spaghetti

A basic pasta dish. It feels almost like cheating to put this in - I mean, I'm not documenting the dishes I make on the fly or from memory, and this is pretty close to some of those - but I got this out of a book, so it qualifies under my self-imposed rules, I guess.



Spaghetti
Olive oil
2 red chillies
1 onion
3 garlic cloves
2 bacon rashers (or more, if you like)
250g eggplant, diced (or more, to match the bacon)
2 tablespoons balsamic vinegar
2 tomatoes, choppes
3 tablespoons shredded basil


Cook spaghetti.

Heat oil to medium heat in a pan and cook bacon, chilli, onion and garlic for five minutes or until onion is soft and bacon is cooked. Remove from pan.

Heat more oil on high heat and cook eggplant, turning until browned.

Add back the bacon mixture. Add the vinegar, tomato and basil. Cook through and season to taste.

Top the spaghetti with eggplant.

(See? EASY.)