Food Lust People Love

Sunday, August 24, 2025

Bacon Cheddar Spinach Waffles

These bacon cheddar spinach waffles are the perfect savory breakfast or dinner, plain, buttered, with syrup or even topped with a sunny-side up egg.

Despite the savory nature of these waffles, we very much enjoyed them with Pearl Milling (formerly Aunt Jemima) butter lite pancake syrup, which our family prefers to real maple syrup. I know, I know, it’s sacrilege to those from maple producing areas, but the taste buds can’t be convinced otherwise. We ate these waffles as breakfast for dinner one evening and the sweet syrup with the savory waffles was perfection.

Then, the very next morning, I popped a couple of the leftover waffles in the toaster and fried a sunny-side up egg to top them with, along with a couple of pats of butter. The runny yolk ran into the buttered waffle holes in a glorious way! Another fabulous meal. Highly recommend, 10/10. Grilled tomatoes optional but they did go nicely.

Bacon Cheddar Spinach Waffles

My frozen spinach is whole leaf so I chop it into smaller bits once thawed. If your frozen spinach is already chopped, you can skip that step. Do not skip the step of pressing out excess liquid once it’s thawed. No cheddar? Substitute your favorite semi-hard cheese. In my Belgian waffle maker, this batter makes 11 square waffles.

Ingredients

3 1/2 oz or 100g frozen spinach, measured frozen, then thawed

1 3/4 cups or 220g flour

1 tablespoon sugar

1 teaspoon double-acting baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda or bicarbonate of soda

1⁄2 teaspoon salt

a few generous grinds of black pepper

3 1/2 oz or 100g mature (sharp) cheddar

3 1/2 oz or 100g real bacon crumbles

2 cups or 480ml buttermilk

1/3 cup or 80ml canola or other light oil, plus extra for greasing the waffle maker

2 eggs

Method

Squeeze any excess liquid out of your thawed spinach then chop it with a sharp knife.

In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients.

Grate your cheddar and add it along with the bacon crumbles to the dry mixture. Toss to coat.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, oil and eggs. Add in the chopped spinach and stir well to combine.

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and fold until well combined.

Preheat your waffle maker as per manufacturer’s instructions.

Using a pastry brush, grease your hot waffle maker with some canola or other light oil.

Pour batter into the center of the lower half of the waffle maker, being careful to leave room for when the batter spreads out as you lower the lid and also for when the waffle starts to rise when baking.

Close the lid and watch for the signal that your waffle is cooking. On my waffle maker, the light is red while it heats up. It goes green when it is ready for batter, red when it is cooking and then green again when the waffle is ready.

I leave the waffles in just a little bit longer after the light turns green the second time so the waffles are nice and crispy. But if you like them less crunchy, by all means take them out earlier.

Put the waffles single file on a pan in a warm oven to keep warm if you aren’t serving them to hungry hordes as soon as they are ready.

Repeat the process until all the batter has become waffles.

Serve them plain, buttered, with syrup or topped with an egg. Refrigerate any leftover waffles and rewarm them in your toaster or oven to serve.

Enjoy!

It’s Sunday FunDay and we are celebrating National Waffle Day which happens to be today! If you have a waffle maker, I suggest you do the same. Check out all of the links below.

Apple Cinnamon Waffles from Mayuri's Jikoni
Bacon Cheddar Spinach Waffles from Food Lust People Love
Gingerbread Waffles from Karen's Kitchen Stories
Gluten Free Waffles with Poached Pears in Balsamic Reduction from Sid's Sea Palm Cooking
Keto Spiced Omelette Waffles from Sneha's Recipe
Oatmeal Waffles from A Day in the Life on the Farm
Protein Waffles from Our Good Life
Waffle Cupcakes from Amy's Cooking Adventures

We are a group of food bloggers who believe that Sunday should be a family fun day, so every Sunday we share recipes that will help you to enjoy your day. If you're a blogger interested in joining us, just visit our Facebook group and request to join.

Pin these Bacon Cheddar Spinach Waffles!

Sunday, August 17, 2025

Family Favorite Tuna Salad

Hard-boiled egg yolks mashed into the mayo/mustard mixture mimics the flavor of homemade mayonnaise in this delicious family favorite tuna salad with a hint of onion.

Food Lust People Love: Hard-boiled egg yolks mashed into the mayo/mustard mixture mimics the flavor of homemade mayonnaise in this delicious family favorite tuna salad with a hint of onion.

In my family, tuna salad and chicken salad are both made with hard-boiled eggs. That’s just the way we’ve always made them and I didn’t realize that not everybody did until I was fully grown up because in the south, we all add eggs.

The first time it was brought to my attention was when I made tuna party sandwiches to share at a non-profit board meeting of the American Association of Malaysia, scheduled for lunchtime. All the board members brought finger foods so we filled our plates and the meeting was called to order.

All of a sudden, the president of the board exclaimed, “Who put tuna in their egg salad?” “On the contrary,” I responded, “I put eggs in my tuna salad! You don’t?” She declared that from then on she certainly would, and after a good laugh and a discussion about who did and didn't put eggs and where in the States we were from, we all got back to business.

Not a very scientific poll but it seemed that those from the southern United States always add eggs. Those from the north or midwest mostly don't. Please leave me a comment yay or nay on eggs in tuna salad and where you are from. I'm just curious.

Family Favorite Tuna Salad

I grate my onion so that there aren’t little crunchy bits in my tuna salad, which I abhor. Grating the onion also creates some onion juice, giving the salad a nice onion flavor throughout. If you don’t mind little crunchy bits, feel free to mince the onion instead and, bonus, you won’t have to share your tuna salad with me.

Ingredients

4 eggs, hard-boiled, cooled and peeled

1/2 cup or 115g mayonnaise

1 tablespoon yellow mustard

1/4 small onion

2 cans (5 oz or 142g) tuna chunks in brine or spring water

1/4-1/2 teaspoon cayenne, depending on your spice level

1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon (or to taste) fine sea salt

Method

Cut the egg whites around the circumference of the yolks. Remove the yolks and put them in a small mixing bowl. Set aside the whites.

Mash the egg yolks with a fork, adding in a few spoons of the mayonnaise.

Once the yolks are relatively smooth, add in the rest of the mayonnaise and mustard. Mix until completely homogeneous.

Grate the onion, making sure that you catch any juice which should also go into the mixture. You can do this on a saucer with a regular grater or directly into the mayo bowl with a microplane.

Add the black pepper, cayenne and salt and stir.

Using a sharp knife, cut the egg whites into irregular pieces, adding them to the bowl. Stir well.

Open your cans of tuna and use the lids to drain the water, squeezing a little. You don’t want the tuna too wet or the tuna salad will be runny.

Add the tuna to the mayo bowl.

Stir gently to mix it in. It’s nice to still have some small chunks of tuna so try not to mash it too much.

Taste the tuna salad. Add a little more salt and pepper, if desired.

This tuna salad is perfect as a sandwich filling but it can also be served with crackers or used to fill a ripe tomato or an avocado half.

Enjoy!

It’s Sunday FunDay and today we are sharing sandwich recipes to celebrate National Sandwich Month. Many thanks to our host, Camilla of Culinary Cam. Check out the links below.

Caramel Pulled Pork Banh Mi Sandwiches by Karen's Kitchen Stories
Chicken Caesar Wraps by Amy's Cooking Adventures
Family Favorite Tuna Salad by Food Lust People Love
Grilled Cheese Extra Ordinary by Sid's Sea Palm Cooking
Hung Curd Veggie Sandwich by Sneha's Recipe
Pie Iron Philly Cheesesteak Sandwiches by Day in the Life on the Farm
Sunflower Pesto Turkey Sandwich by Our Good Life

Pin our Family Favorite Tuna Salad!

Wednesday, August 13, 2025

Shrimp and Quail Egg Garden Salad

A delightfully fresh dish for summer, this shrimp and quail egg garden salad make a lovely lunch for two by itself or side dish for a potluck or barbecue.

Since I was a child, I’ve loved quail eggs. Hardboiled with a spicy mayo dipping sauce, they are the perfect picnic food. But they are also very versatile and an easy, tasty, bite-sized way to add protein to a meal.

If you are also a fan of quail eggs, you might want to check out a few of my recipes that feature them.

Shrimp and Quail Egg Garden Salad

I happened to have some blood oranges in my fruit drawer so I used them in the salad and the dressing. Substitute regular oranges, mandarins or even tangerines if you don’t.

Ingredients to serve two for lunch

For the dressing:

1/4 cup or 60ml olive oil

2 tablespoons freshly squeezed orange juice

2 tablespoons cider vinegar

1/4 teaspoon mustard powder

Freshly ground black pepper

3 oz or 85g crumbled feta

For the salad:

1/2 heart of romaine

1 heirloom or summer tomato

1 orange

10-12 cold boiled shrimp, peeled, tails intact

10-12 hardboiled quail eggs, peeled and halved

2 green onions, green part only, sliced

Method

In a mixing bowl, whisk together the olive oil, orange juice and vinegar along with the mustard powder and black pepper.

Add in the crumbled feta and stir. Set aside until ready to serve. Chill if it will be a while.

Wash and spin your lettuce leaves. Trim any hard ends and discard. Rip the rest into bite size pieces and spread them around on your serving plate. Cut the tomato into wedges and add them to the lettuce.

Peel the orange and cut it into bite-sized pieces.

Scatter them among the tomatoes, along with the shrimp and halved quail eggs.

Sprinkle on the sliced green onions. Give the dressing another good stir then serve it alongside the salad so each person can dress their own (especially if you think there might be leftovers) or spoon the dressing over the salad and serve.

Enjoy!

Welcome to the 17th edition of Alphabet Challenge 2025, brought to you by the letter Q. Many thanks to Wendy from A Day in the Life on the Farm for organizing and creating the challenge. Check out all the Q recipes below: