Mixed Greens with Bruschettatopped withGoat Cheese and Fig-Olive Tapenade
Salads are the perfect vehicle for making your own recipe! In fact, almost anything could be made into a salad.
From a culinary perspective, there are many different types of salads:
- Appetizer salads – stimulate appetite with flavors and appearance but don’t fill
- Accompaniment salad– must complement the main dish; should be light and flavorful
- Main-Course salad– should contain a substantial portion of protein
- Separate-Course salad– cleanse palate and refresh appetite; must be light
- Dessert Salads – sweet and contain fruits, gelatin and nuts
The structure of a salad should include the following components:
- Base or Underliner
- Body
- Garnish – edible decorative item added for eye appeal – simple
- Dressing – seasoned liquid added to the body of salad for flavor, tartness, spiciness and moistness
Salads can be classified into the following categories:
- Green Salads
- Vegetable, Grain, Legume and Pasta Salads
- Bound salads – held together with a dressing such as mayo
- Fruit Salads
- Composed Salads
- Gelatin Salads
- Gelatin dissolves in water at 100* andis mixed with cold liquid to avoid lumping; For flavored gelatin sweetened with sugar, use 24 oz of gelatin per gallon of water; For unflavored gelatin, use 2.5 oz per gallon of liquid; The setting power is weakened by acids so salads need more gelatin; Raw pineapple and papaya shouldn’t be added to gelatin
The incredible diversity of salad greens available makes salad recipes easy to create. You can choose from wonderful offerings such as:
| Iceberg | Romaine or Cos | Boston | Bibb or Limestone |
| Loose-leaf | Escarole or Broad-leaf Endive | Chicory or Curly Endive | Frisee |
| Belgian endive or Witloof Chicory | Chinese Cabbage | Spinach | Watercress |
| Arugula | Mesclun – mixture of tender baby lettuce | Baby Lettuces | Sprouts |
| Microgreens | Tatsoi | Mizuna – Japanese mustard greens | Mache – corn salad, lamb’s lettuce/tongue, field salad |
| Radicchio | Treviso | Dandelion Greens |
Toenhance the flavor of your base ingredients,prepare one of the following types of dressings:
- Oil and vinegar – ratio for vinaigrette is 2 parts oil to 1 part vinegar
- Mayonnaise-based – lecithin in egg is stabilizer
- Cooked dressing – similar to mayo but made with starch thickener
And even when it comes to oil, you have so many choices to make your own recipe:
- Corn – golden color but almost tasteless
- Cottonseed, soybean, canola and safflower – all tasteless and commonly used forsalad oil blends
- Peanut – more expensive but provides a mildyetunique flavor
- Olive – very distinctive flavor and aroma; while much more expensive, extra virgin is the best because it’s made from the first press of the olives
- Walnut –very specialtaste but expensive and highly perishable
- Winterized – treated to remain clear when chilled
Vinegar (or other acids such as citrus) provide further options for customization:
- Cider – made from apples; brown and sweet
- White – distilled and purified so neutral flavor
- Wine – white or red wine-like flavor
- Flavored – another product added
- Sherry – made from sherry wine
- Balsamic – dark brown; wine vinegar aged in wood barrels
To get ideas for how to start making your own dressing recipes, check out this post:
