5 Ingredients or Fewer

Bacon, Lettuce & Strawberry Sandwich

by:
October  4, 2022
5
4 Ratings
Bacon, Lettuce & Strawberry Sandwich
Photo by Ty Mecham
  • Prep time 10 minutes
  • Cook time 10 minutes
  • Makes 1 sandwich
Author Notes

A classic BLT, but instead of summery tomatoes, springtime strawberries. Call it an easy excuse to start BLT—er, BLS—season a few months early. If you’re raising your eyebrows at strawberries in a savory application, think of it this way: Tomatoes are a fruit; strawberries are a fruit. Tomatoes are red, juicy, sweet; strawberries are red and juicy and sweet. Tomatoes are delicious; strawberries are delicious.

Beyond the strawberries, the rest of the ingredients are up to you. My dream sandwich has crisp-but-chewy bacon, grainy-seedy bread, and an ungodly amount of mayonnaise. But maybe instead you want cracker-crisp bacon, sourdough bread, and a mere wisp of mayonnaise. It’s all good. I like iceberg lettuce here for its watery crunch and neutral flavor. If you only have romaine, butterhead, or even baby arugula around, though, why not give that a go?

Don’t skip this step: Salting the strawberries before starting the rest of the sandwich draws out their juices, concentrates their flavor, and mingles with the mayo to form a pseudo-dressing. If you can only find smaller strawberries (often these are the sweetest), increase the quantity as needed. You want an uninterrupted layer of berries on the bread.

This is one of our Big Little Recipes, our weekly column all about dishes with big flavor and little ingredient lists. Do you know (and love) a recipe that’s low in ask, high in reward? Let us know in the comments. —Emma Laperruque

What You'll Need
Ingredients
  • 4 to 6 ripe strawberries, tops removed and halved or quartered vertically
  • Kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
  • 2 thick slices bacon, halved
  • 2 slices bread
  • 4 leaves iceberg lettuce
  • Mayonnaise, to taste
Directions
  1. Add the strawberries to a bowl and sprinkle with a pinch each of salt and pepper. Toss, then let hang out while you work on the rest of the sandwich.
  2. Add the bacon to a cast-iron skillet and set over medium heat. Cook, shuffling around and flipping until crisp, 6 to 8 minutes.
  3. Use tongs to transfer the bacon to a plate, then immediately add the bread to the pan. Cook for 1 to 2 minutes per side, lowering the heat if needed, until the bread is toasty and golden-brown. Transfer the bread to a plate and let cool for a couple minutes.
  4. Spread each slice of bread with mayo, then build the sandwich in this order: strawberries, bacon, lettuce. Slice in half and eat immediately.
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Emma Laperruque
Emma was the food editor at Food52. She created the award-winning column, Big Little Recipes, and turned it into a cookbook in 2021. These days, she's a senior editor at Bon Appétit, leading digital cooking coverage. Say hello on Instagram at @emmalaperruque.

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5 Reviews

Pam W.
Pam W. June 6, 2023
Just delicious, and exceptionally handy in the spring when tomatoes are often iffy, but strawberries are at their best. I will have to try a balsamic glaze after reading the review below. Sounds scrumptious.
 
Heather A.
Heather A. May 23, 2020
Absolutely lovely. We always do bacon in the oven instead, and used the drippings to rub all over the sourdough and toast on the same sheet pan under the broiler. Tossed the strawberries with just a drizzle of fig balsamic syrup, too, because we had it. This was a sublime sandwich.
 
Jody
Jody May 15, 2020
I grew up with the addition of peanut butter on my BLTs. That's just how my Dad always made them. I don't know where the tradition came from. Replacing the tomatoes with strawberries and keeping the PB makes a kind of crunchy, salty PB & J...
 
LCMiles
LCMiles May 6, 2020
As someone who does not particularly enjoy tomatoes and has long wanted to participate in the phenomenon that is a BLT, I am very much looking forward to trying this as soon as I can get my hands on some seasonal strawberries.
 
fenrox
fenrox May 5, 2020
Yo! This was great! First, dont halve the strawberries, its too hard to eat. Second, red wine vinegar! Third, add some avocado.

It bridges the whole thing together. A really amazing way to eat this is a slaw, if you have a mandolin, shred everything and eat it open face. Just dont mix or shred the strawberries, they mush out and the whole thing is jam if you do.