If you love pea salad and bacon this salad is a win win! It's a great salad to serve for Spring holidays like Easter and a great green meal addition for St. Patrick's Day! It's also a great side dish to a summer BBQ meal, a crowd pleaser for gatherings or comfort food loving guests.

I actually wasn't too familiar with pea salad until a few years ago when I was introduced to it at a friends' holiday party. It just wasn't something that was made in my family growing up. I was instantly in love with this creamy side including chopped eggs and onions. I realized very quickly after watching other people's reactions to it that this there is a definite love or hate reaction to pea salad. I've been on the love side since my first bite, having trouble staying away from it, going back for more and more, trying to sneak more salad without looking too wolfish.

Pea Salad with Bacon plated and in serve bowl

Bacon Bites

If you are a pea salad lover like me, adding bacon just makes it even better! Instead of just cooking the bacon till it's crispy and then crumble it into the salad, I find that the bacon is nicer chopped into small rectangles before cooking. That way you get chunks of bacon; consistent small bite size pieces throughout the salad. It also makes for a more attractive presentation of the salad. If you prefer just crumbling the bacon though be my guest, it will still taste just as great!

Family and Kid Favorite Salad

My kids like peas for the most part, but not as much as they love broccoli. No, that's not a typo. I speak the truth. I sneak peas into their pasta or rice dishes often, but at times depending on their mood they pick them out or eat around them. Toddlers' food likes and dislikes change so often. This pea salad recipe though has surprisingly become a favorite of theirs now. My kids love this version since I started making it this way just a few months ago. They wouldn't even touch pea salads I would make because I made it with raw onion, as it usually made. For this version I use dehydrated onion so you still get the nice onion flavor, but not the raw onion bite that shys some people away from it. I think that's why this version can be a big hit with more people.

This salad has also quickly become an instant favorite with visiting family members (I use family as guinea pigs of course to try my recipe concoctions). Family members who have sampled this salad over the last few months couldn't get enough of it, asking for the recipe, so here it it! Now you all have it!

Enjoy and let me know how your family or friends like it!

Pea Salad with Bacon

Print Recipe

★★★★★

5 from 1 reviews

A family favorite! Great for holidays, BBQ or parties.

Author: Katia
Prep Time: 15 minutes
Cook Time: 25 minutes
Total Time: 40 minutes
Yield: 6 1x
Category: Lunch or Dinner Side Salad

Ingredients

Scale

24 oz frozen sweet peas, thawed
4 slices thick apple-wood smoked bacon, chopped small and cooked til crispy
4 hard-boiled eggs, peeled and finely chopped
¼ cup real mayonnaise
2 Tbsp dehydrated onion, hydrated in water 10 mins and squeezed out
½ tsp salt
¼ tsp granulated garlic
¼ tsp black pepper
¼ tsp smoked paprika
drizzle of extra virgin olive oil

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Instructions

Hard boil eggs, peel and finely chop
Cut bacon into small rectangles while raw and then cook in pan till crispy, remove from pan and place atop paper towel lined plate
Add thawed peas to a medium mixing bowl.
Combine mayonnaise, hydrated onion and salt through paprika in a small bowl. Stir till well combined.
Add mayo/spice mixture to bowl with peas, combine well.
Lastly add chopped eggs and bacon and combine (*Optional leave a small amount of chopped egg and bacon out of mixture and sprinkle on top of salad serving bowl for presentation)
Chill the salad in refrigerator 30 mins to 1 hr
Once ready to serve just drizzle a little olive oil to freshen salad and combine. Also taste salad and adjust pepper and/or salt per taste.