Salad: Beyond the Iceberg {Back to Basics Cooking Series}

We begin our Back to Basics Cooking Series with the humblest of dishes: The Salad. It’s the perfect way to turn over a new leaf; to recover from overindulging during the holidays. If making a salad has, in the past, meant opening a bag of iceberg with shredded carrots, drenching in bottled ranch dressing and calling it a day, read on.

The great thing about salads is, you can use just about anything in them. Fruits, vegetables, herbs, lettuce, nuts, cheese, meat, and the list goes on. Experiment to find your favorite combinations.

Salad Tips:

• Lettuce is easy to grow and prevalent at farmers markets. Depending on where you live, since this is mid-winter, you might need to check out your local grocery store or find out if there are any hydroponic growers in your area. The fresher the lettuce, the more tasty your salad.
• If using pre-bagged, branch out beyond the iceberg, which has little nutritional value or taste (in my opinion). There are several kinds of lettuce, ranging from spinach to arugula to radicchio. Try a new one today!
• Always wash your lettuce. Cut off the stem and swish leaves in a bowl of cold water.
• Salad spinners work for drying, but only if they are not overcrowded. You can also store the spun lettuce right in the spinner in the refrigerator.
• Another technique for drying, from The Art of Simple Food: Spread leaves in a single layer on a dish towel, gently roll up, and store the towel in the refrigerator until it’s time to serve the salad. (It will keep for a few hours)
• Next time you’re at a restaurant, bring a notepad. Check out the salad descriptions and jot down the combinations that sound good. Then, go home and try to recreate it. I get tons of ideas that way! You’ll start to get an idea of what is normally in a chef’s salad, a southwest salad, etc.
• Oil & vinegar make a simple dressing. Sometimes I even ask for oil & vinegar in restaurants if I’m not sure about the quality of their dressing. We’ll talk more about making your own dressings and sauces next week, but it is super easy to just sprinkle some oil over the salad (use any kind, you can even experiment with flavored or infused oils) and then sprinkle some vinegar (again, be crazy! Just don’t use white distilled, that’s kind of gross. Think apple cider, rice wine, or balsamic).

Hopefully these tips have inspired you to make a new salad of your own creation. Come back on Friday Jan. 6, 2012 to link up your salad blog posts or let us know how it went in the comments section. I’ll be sharing a few recipes over the next couple of days.

This post shared at Kitchen Tip Tuesdays, Monday Mania