Salads to Die For
Posted on May 7, 2007
I don’t know how many times I’ve eaten a meal where a) the salad was just a bland, crude accessory (most often) and b) the salad outshone the main course (rarely). Of course, I guess there are also occasions when both the salad and main course are terrible (often) and when they are both great (even more rare).
What’s going on in the dining world?
Most high-volume American restaurants have this idea that you must overwhelm both the appetite and senses when serving a salad, so you’ll get a bowl about the size of tanker car filled with everything imaginable. It’s like the oversized plates of food that somehow sell despite the obesity of the diners (or maybe because of) and the ridiculous and useless number of extra calories in today’s platings. Big is in, and big doesn’t always taste the best. In fact, it usually is meant to mask an indifference to the whole cooking-dining experience.
I bring this up because I find a salad one of the most refreshing repasts imaginable but also one that is almost always abused, either in the manner above (a mish-mash piled higher and deeper with indifference) or in not using fresh ingredients and house/home-made dressings.
To the rescue comes Saveur magazine, which in its May 2007 edition features “Toss&Serve,” the perfect companion for making for salads and the dressings to adorn them.
This is must reading for all, especially those restaurateurs who have the bigger-is-better mentality that seems to have overtaken the American dining experience and certainly for those of us who enjoy the fresh, natural flavors of nature’s bounty served in exquistely balanced proportions.
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