I never heard of wilted lettuce.

Leaf lettuce, sliced green onions, warm bacon drippings, and apple cider vinegar. That was my Mom's recipe, with fresh lettuce and onions from the garden. So delicious, especially with some cornbread muffins.

My grandma used to make that, I think as a way to use lettuce from Grandpa's big vegetable garden that was maybe bolting and getting bitter. I recall it was a sweet dressing with vinegar and celery seed, heated to boiling and poured over the lettuce to wilt it.

Lots of other family members loved it, but I wasn't too crazy about it, so I do not have the recipe. I'll bet it was pretty much like woodrose's tho...

Was a favorite of mine as a kid. My mom sometimes added chopped hard boiled eggs.

My mom had a 1950 Betty Crocker cookbook and use make this dessert every once and awhile. It was one of my favorites and I still make it. Great when you crave something chocolate.

Hot Fudge Pudding Cake

I have probably made that Fudge Pudding Cake before. I have some of Betty Crocker's old cook books.

Sue

I've been using this recipe, I got here in the 90s (!), for years!

I make the full recipe because I have friends who HAVE to have jars whenever I make it.

Sharon's Homemade Sweet & Sour Bacon Dressing
**********************************
Fry 1lb. bacon in heavy pot till crisp. Drain & break into tiny pieces-not crumbled! Pour out half the grease-leave rest in pot.
ADD:
****
5 eggs (beaten with a spoon)
5 1/2 cups sugar
1 1/4 tsp. salt
MIX WELL.
ADD:
***
1 cup flour
5 tsps dry mustard
MIX WELL-use slotted spoon or whisk
ADD:
****
2 1/2 cups CIDER vinegar
5 cups water-Mix till well blended.

* Heat on medium-stirring often, but not constantly, as this lowers the cooking temperature.
In about 15-20 minutes, mixture will begin to thicken. Make sure you scrape sides of pot & the bottom-often-don't let burn!
* Once it is as thick as a medium gravy-remove from heat, and add bacon and 2 TBS margarine or butter.
DRESSING WILL THICKEN AS IT COOLS.

Sharon says: You may think this makes an awful lot-but it keeps in the fridge for 4 weeks--share with a neighbor!
Excellent on Spinach Salads, Baked Potatoes, or just lettuce. Really good if you microwave a serving for 30 seconds or till just warm.

ENJOY, ENJOY, ENJOY.
Makes great Xmas gifts- just buy jelly jars, and add a bow around the neck of the jar. When my mom had her brain surgery-I took jars to the ICU for the Drs & nurses. At noon-I'd go to the cafeteria to eat & here I'd see all of them walking in with their 'dressing jars" LOL!

Note from Ang - this is great for dipping egg rolls and fried won tons in too!

"I have some of Betty Crocker's old cookbooks."

Marilyn_Sue, my mom gave me this one when I was 9. I still have it but it's a bit tattered.

I don't have a recipe for it, but I remember eating a wilted salad that used an herbed oil instead of bacon grease.

Omg I love wilted lettuce. I’m not home but I’ll check when I get home if I have the recipe in my Mom’s recipe box.

Cloebud, I have the same cookbook.

Susie, I was so excited when I got it. I begged my mom to let me stay home from school so I could lose myself in the book (she said NO!). Bonnie Butter Cake was the first recipe I tried.

My mom gave me her copy of the 1950 Betty Crocker's cookbook when I left home to be on my own. I still have it but it was falling apart, I had used it so much, so I put it away to keep and bought a "like new" one on ebay to use.

Still on the shelf, with the original electrical tape holding the binder together. I think I was 7 or 8

.

I don't have a wilted lettuce recipe but I do have a wilted spinach recipe with brie cheese and sauteed sliced green apples.

Grandma used to call it "killed lettuce", she'd cut up a bowl of lettuce from the garden and top it with some sliced green onions, then mix 2 tablespoons of cider vinegar, 2 tablespoons of bacon grease and 1 tablespoon of sugar until it boiled, pour it over the lettuce/onion mixture and serve.

Not really a recipe, but I can easily remember the ratio of 2/2/1...

Annie

I have a 1960s Betty Crocker binder cookbook I 'adopted' from my mom that is literally falling apart, along with a couple of the older hardcover 'picture' cookbooks. I have their cookie book as well and a number of other specialty cookbooks. I love those books - so many reliably good recipes - esp. the one bowl cakes!

My mother used to make it. I thought it looked disgusting, but I was a VERY picky eater as a child. I remember she used hot bacon grease, chopped hardboiled eggs - not sure what else. It was a favorite of hers.

I think, as a child, I hated anything with chopped hard boiled eggs in it, since I wouldn't touch my great aunts' chopped liver, nor the picnic potato salad, and especially egg salad.

I've come around a bit since then, I'm happy to say, but I still don't like eggs in my chopped liver.

Oh, and I have an old Betty Crocker child's cookbook too, a birthday gift from my Grandmother when I was about 6 or 7:

When I got married to my first husband in 1974 she gave me this one:

And, of course, this is about half of my cookbook collection. The binders are all Cooking Forum recipes, including Thibault's Table and Moe's Diner, thanks to AnnT.

I do have all Grandma's old Farm Journal cookbooks, maybe there's a wilted lettuce recipe in there somewhere. Grandma's favorite cookbook was by Meta Givens, something called "The Modern Family Cookbook". Here is her recipe, somewhat different, and not what Grandma used.

Sorry about the sideways picture, I don't know how to fix that....

Annie

blfenton, can you post the recipe you mentioned? It sounds fabulous!

This is one version I have jotted down. I remember my mom would sometimes use spinach and add sliced egg and mushrooms.

Wilted Lettuce With Hot Bacon Dressing

About 6 cups greens of choice
1/4 cup green sliced green onions (or 1/4 cup thinly sliced red onion)
5-6 slices bacon, chopped
1/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup white wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar

Cook the bacon pieces till crisp. Remove from pan and drain on paper towel.

Add the sugar to the bacon fat and pour into a heatproof bowl. Combine lettuce and onion in salad bowl. Slowly add vinegar to dressing mixing well. Toss dressing with salad.

Dressing can be made in advance. Reheat in microwave 15-20 seconds before tossing with salad just before serving.

I recall my grandma cooking the bacon in a pan, then making the hot dressing with the bacon grease in the same pan.

Carol, you could definitely just use the pan. My mom would mix it all in a Pyrex measuring cup to make it easier to pour over the salad.

I've never had a recipe for it but remember watching my mom make it. Like Carol's grandma, I cook the bacon and then gently saute some green onion in with the mostly cooked bacon & grease. Then combine some apple cider vinegar and water & pour into the pan w/ the bacon & onion. Heat til it all just or just about boils & then pour it over the salad.

I add the water to cut the acidity of the vinegar. Never thought to add a bit of sugar but that would work, too. My leaf lettuce is about ready to cut again so I'll have to try it with the sugar.

My Grandma's always had sugar. Maybe this week I shall have to make some. I do recall she also made her dandelion greens the same way. I don't recall onions in hers but I shall use them as I have grown some onions. Thank you everyone for your recipes.

Sue

I can remember my Mom making it, not that I would eat it though. Funny thing is, I've thought about it lately and considered making it-I have a lot of lettuce.
Here's the recipe from her c.1942 Searchlight cookbook.

put up a bushel of sweet corn... got ten quart... and made some of Sharons’s bacon salad dressing. it is sweet and Lars would NOT care for it. Got a half gallon plus 3/4 of a quart. Am thinking scallions and black olives in it would be a nice last minute addition. It is pretty tasty IMHO. Thanks for the recipe.

uh, i licked the pot...

My grandmother....and I used to do this years ago...cut up about 4 slices of bacon and fry until crisp, whisk in about a rounded tablespoon of flour and sliwly add some vinegar ( cider vinegar) until it was like gravy....cooking all the time....stir and cook a bit longer and add sugar to taste....pour over a bowl of baby Thompson's seedless lettuce leaves and enjoy.
She also made a cream dressing for baby garden lettuce....she took cream...actually "top milk" and dissolved sugar into it..... About half cut of cream and 2 rounded teaspoons of sugar......stir until sugar is all dissolved and and add "some" vinegar and pour over the garden lettuce.

I would say the wilted lettuce must be where the spinach salad of the 80s came from.