I stumbled upon a really amazing café a couple of months ago after my baby class and I am obsessed with it.  Surprise, surprise, I am pretty picky about what and where I eat.  I like lots of vegetables, seasonal produce, clean  and interesting flavors.  It is a pretty tall order.  There are plenty of restaurants and cafes that offer adequate dishes, but they tend to get boring after a while, but not Thyme Market & Café.

Thyme offers a whole range of interesting salads and sandwiches for lunch, but the thing that I LOVE is the deli case filled with vegetable, fruit, and grain salads.  This selection seems to change daily and it is never disappointing. Each week I order a selection of three of the daily salads, usually two vegetables and a grain based salad.  This is my favorite way to eat.  I really enjoy having several options and not having to choose only one! 

Last week, I had a butternut squash salad which also included arugula, a tiny bit of bacon, dried cranberries and manchego cheese.  It was so good, I imediately planned out my recreation of this dish.  What I particularly enjoyed about it was the combination of flavors and textures.  The squash was really sweet, the bacon salty and crispy and I love the bitterness of the arugula.  I am not lying when I say I dreammt about this salad.  As I always do, I made several servings so that I could enjoy this for a couple of meals throughout the week.  Here's my take on Butternut Squash Arugula Salad:

Butternut Squash Salad

1 large butternut squash, peeled and diced into 1 inch pieces (about 4 cups)

2 cups arugula

½ cup currants

¼ pound sulfite free bacon

¼ pound manchego cheese, sliced

Olive oil

Sea salt & pepper

Put bacon in a large sauté pan and turn heat to medium.  Cook for about 4 minutes until golden then flip and cook on the other side another 4 minutes or so.  Remove bacon from the pan and set aside.  Add butternut squash to the pan, and cover.  Stir the squash after a few minutes and return cover.  Check again after another few minutes .  Squash is done when easily pierced with a fork.   Transfer squash to a large bowl.  Season with sea salt and pepper to taste. 

Slice bacon into ½ to 1 inch pieces and toss in with the squash.   When squash cools down to room temperature, fold in arugula, manchego and cranberries.  Drizzle with olive oil.