Roasted Butternut Squash Salad with Shallot Dressing and Bacon

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This Roasted Butternut Squash Salad is our go-to fall salad. It’s loaded with autumnal flavors and fun textures, like sweet roasted squash, salty bacon, nutty pecans, tangy goat cheese, a maple-shallot vinaigrette, and irresistible bacon-fat croutons. Make this salad as a tasty main dish or serve it as a hearty side.

Why You’ll Love This Salad

Healthy vegetables, including one secretly in the dressing. This salad has roasted butternut squash, mixed salad greens, and shallots (in the vinaigrette), so it feels as nutritious as it is hearty.
Bacon croutons are back. If you loved our bacon croutons in our Cobb Salad, then you’ll love their reappearance in this salad too. They add so much crunch and umami flavor!
Balance of textures and flavors. This salad has everything: fresh, leafy lettuce, soft roasted squash, tangy, creamy goat cheese, salty, crisp bacon, nutty toasted pecans, crunchy umami croutons, and an irresistible shallot dressing.
Hearty but not too heavy. With all of the bright and bold flavors, fiber, and protein, this salad will fill you up without weighing you down.
Can be used as a main dish or as a side on your holiday table. We love to serve this salad as the main event for dinner, but it’s also great as a vegetable side for the holidays.
Easy to make ahead. You can make pretty much all parts of this salad the day before serving, meaning you’ll have time to mingle with friends and family and enjoy the appetizers everyone else is bringing to the holiday meal.

Top down view of oval dish filled with mixed greens, squash, bacon, pecans, goat cheese and croutons.

Ingredients in the Roasted Butternut Squash Salad

Baby lettuce, green leaf lettuce, or mixed greens – use a light fluffy lettuce, not something that is too crunchy or tough. We recommend baby lettuces (we like this mix from Trader Joe’s), green leaf, red leaf, or mixed greens.
Butternut squash – we like to buy pre-cut squash for this to save time and effort, but you can also cut up a fall squash if you prefer.
Bacon – we prefer using a thick cut bacon. Save some of the rendered bacon fat for the croutons too, if you’re making them. You can even use turkey bacon, but you’d need to make the croutons with olive oil instead of bacon fat because turkey is so lean.
Goat cheese – you can use pre-crumbled for ease, or crumble it yourself.
Toasted pecans – you can opt for pre-toasted or toast them yourself in a dry pan over medium heat for about 3 minutes.
Bacon croutons – made with cubed bread and rendered bacon fat (or olive oil, if you prefer).
Shallot dressing – made with shallots, olive oil, red wine vinegar, maple syrup, spicy brown mustard, and salt and pepper.

How To Make Roasted Butternut Squash Salad

Preheat your oven to 400°F and line a baking sheet with parchment paper. Place the squash on the sheet and toss it with a little olive oil and salt and pepper. Bake it for 20 to 25 minutes or until it’s soft but not mushy. Remove the squash from the oven to cool, but leave the oven on for the croutons.

Toss the squash with olive oil, salt, and pepper
Roast the squash for 20 to 25 minutes

Place the bacon in a cold frying pan and turn the heat on to medium. Cook for about 8 to 12 minutes for thick cut bacon (if using thin cut, it’ll take less time), flipping over every couple of minutes. Remove the bacon from the frying pan and place onto a paper towel lined plate. Set aside the rendered bacon fat to use on the bacon croutons later. Once the bacon has cooled, roughly chop it.
Toss the cubed bread in the rendered bacon fat (or olive oil, if using instead), then arrange on a baking sheet. Bake the croutons at 400°F for about 10 to 12 min or until desired crispness.
Add the dressing ingredients to a high sided container and blend with an immersion blender. Taste for seasoning and sweetness (if you want it sweeter, add a bit more maple syrup).
If your pecans aren’t already toasted, toast them in a dry pan until they begin to smell nutty, about 3 minutes.
Assemble the salad by mixing the lettuce with the roasted squash, pecans, bacon, goat cheese, and croutons. Drizzle dressing over salad and toss to combine.

Close up of butternut squash salad with shallot dressing on top.

Emily & Rachel’s Tips for the Best Roasted Butternut Squash Salad

Rachel and Emily from Cooking with Conks, standing side-by-side in green and yellow aprons.

Buy the pre-cut butternut squash, if you can. It’ll save you a lot of time and effort, and using pre-cut won’t have any impact on how this salad turns out. If you do use a whole squash and cut it yourself, use a sharp knife and cut it very carefully. Tips for how to cut a butternut squash can be found in this Serious Eats article.

Be careful not to over roast the butternut squash or it’ll be too soft and will fall apart in the salad.
Use soft, leafy lettuce like green leaf or mixed greens instead of iceberg or romaine. The latter kinds are too crunchy, slightly watery, and won’t complement the rest of the salad ingredients.
Use an immersion blender to make the dressing, if you can. A food processor can work but it won’t get it as blended and the flavors won’t meld as well together.

Serving and Storage Suggestions

This salad is best served right away. We often like to enjoy it as a main dish, but it’s also good with a simple protein option, like our Moroccan-Inspired Spiced Chicken or our Sweet and Smoky Salmon. It’s also great served with a side like our Easy Parmesan Cheese Bread or even our Simple Roasted Broccoli with Lemon for an extra dose of veggies.

If you’re making this salad ahead of time, we suggest storing all of the ingredients separately so that the salad doesn’t get soggy. If you’re planning on eating some of it now and saving the rest for later, it’s best not to dress the salad or mix in the croutons. Instead, just drizzle the dressing onto individual portions and top those with croutons.

Close up view of salad with mixed greens, squash, croutons, goat cheese, pecans, and bacon.

Variations and Substitutions

We love this salad as is and we think you will too, but if you’re missing one of the ingredients or have dietary restrictions, there are some things you can do to customize it.

If you can’t stand or can’t find butternut squash, feel free to use a different winter squash like delicata or honey patch, or you could even use roasted sweet potatoes or fruit (like apples or persimmons) in place of the squash.
Don’t like goat cheese? You can leave it out or use manchego, parmesan, or even Gouda.
To make this vegetarian, skip the bacon and make regular croutons instead of bacon ones.
Make this salad with arugula for a peppery kick.

FAQs: Roasted Butternut Squash Salad

Yes, this is an easy salad to make ahead. To do that, we suggest roasting the butternut squash early, then let it come to room temperature and store it in the fridge in an airtight container. You can also mix up the dressing ahead of time and store it in the fridge until you’re ready to use it. The bacon can also be cooked ahead of time and stored in the fridge. You can even make the bacon croutons ahead of time and store them in an airtight container at room temperature. In other words, you can make everything in advance so that you can save time on the big day itself.

Yes, you can. To do so, omit the goat cheese, bacon, and make the croutons with olive oil instead of bacon fat. You can add your favorite plant-based protein, like beans, lentils, tempeh, or seitan, or even tofu.

Definitely! Skip the croutons or use gluten-free bread. Make sure the mustard you’re using in the dressing is gluten-free too, but the other ingredients should be fine.

Use a different winter squash or replace the squash with roasted sweet potatoes, or even apples or fuyu persimmons.