Stop the World, I Want to Get Salads

Throughout History great trenchermen have taken the whole world for their salad bowl. As early as 1631, the English cookbook author John Murre described a "Grand Sallet" fashioned not with run-of-the-garden greens from his British Isles, but with sun-drenched fruits from Mediterranean groves, livened with French capers. Goethe, in a burst of lyricism to the anchovy, once struck off a poem beginning, "Die Welt ist ein Sardellensalat." Even Alexander Dumas the younger, who never failed to pay homage to his native land as the very heart of the comestible universe, turned to the Orient when he dreamed up his now-classic Japanese salad of mussels, potatoes and truffles in a vinaigrette dressing.

Now and then one of the newer crop of salad men may hesitate when he looks at some of the foreign salads for the first time. Take the Sicilian octopus salad—and you should. Too many Americans have reservations about tangling with this kind of epicurean challenge, even though octopus is still sold in every respectable Italian fish stall in this country. In making the doughty kind of salad all men like in the summer, the octopus' ten-armed cousin, the squid, can be a saline delight. Baby squids are no more trouble to boil than lobsters, and when fresh they are every bit as succulent. In the mouth of every sea-minded gourmet, ice-cold squid marinated in olive oil, lemon juice and mint turns into pure manna.

The first and most striking view, in any cook's tour of the verdant world of salads, is the vast number of them parading under the deceptive guise of appetizers. The Norwegian salad of diced herring, potatoes, apples, veal and beetroot—a baroque but very delicious combination—appears on the smorgasbord table as just one of a large line-up of appetite stimuli. Frenchmen, in their own bistros, particularly at noontime, will call for the hors d'oeuvres cart laden with ox-mouth salad, mushrooms in oil and vinegar, marinated artichoke hearts and beef with pickle salad. They will pile the plate high at least once, and then sometimes even twice and thrice. The salads are then methodically demolished along with a mountain of heavily buttered French bread. These culinary rites are often concluded with an unpretentious baba au rhum and a pot of dark roasted coffee. It's all done in the most casual style, but it winds up as a salad meal in the best Rabelaisian tradition. Even many of the Chinese start, and sometimes finish, their feasts with a salad known as Leng Pan, or cold plate. Strangely, Chinese restaurants in America are often timid about including salads on their menus. But transplanted Chinese gourmets in their American homes offer them forth-rightly as the beginning, middle and even the end of a sumptuous single-platter meal.

On the surface, salad making looks like a transparent art. You glance into a big bowl. You see julienne of ham, chicken and swiss cheese strewn over a combination of greens and, without further investigation, you know the recipe for a chef's salad. But the power to make your chef's salad a cut above the next one and to eventually perfect it, means mastering the salad dressing. It is an art that takes a sensitive hand and an even more sensitive palate. Just saying that a salad dressing needs a clove of garlic or a small onion isn't nearly enough. Garlic bulbs, like onions, vary in their virility, mostly depending on age. The wise garlic man always moves slowly but surely. Under no circumstances should a chef have truck with the antigarlic cult of the ancient poet Horace, who advised mistresses to put their hands over the mouth of any garlic-eating Roman offering his kisses and to hide under the bed sheets to avoid his caresses. In France, experienced salad men will often merely rub a cut clove of garlic on the inside of the bowl and then throw the garlic away. Or they will rub garlic onto a piece of bread, called a chapon, and permit it to loiter in the salad bowl until its fragrance is barely detectable. In the south of France, however, gourmets love a thick salad dressing called aïoli or Beurré de Provence, which is really a garlic-flavored mayonnaise. Here the flavor greets you like a hearty handshake in a country tavern. Garlic-flavored wine vinegar found on most gourmet shelves is a thoroughly dependable means of releasing the herb's volatile perfume. When it comes to the choice of the proper oil, no Continental salad maker trained in the Grande Cuisine will use anything but olive oil in his dressings. Brands of olive oil vary from light, winsome flavors to those with heavy peasanty overtones. All olive oil for salad dressing should be virgin, that is, the first pressing of the olives. But it isn't necessary to go to the lengths of some olive oil addicts who demand a certain vintage olive oil and won't pour a dressing into a bowl unless the bowl itself is made from the root of an old olive tree.

For some reason, most Americans insist on serving salad only in a salad bowl. International gourmets are much less bound to this stringent convention. For mixing purposes, the salad bowl is extremely useful. But then, so is a large pot or saucepan. At the table, particularly for the meat, poultry and seafood salads, however, it's good sport to exploit the show-off effects of big silver or china platters, long copper au gratin dishes or shallow casseroles. A salpicon of lobster is perfect served in a coquille or scallop shell. Even punch bowls can be pressed into service as outsize salad bowls.

It's no accident that when a man and a woman order a salad to be mixed at the table in a restaurant, the maître de just naturally hands the bowl to the man to do the honors. It's a man's salad world and the reasons are not open to question. The hearty mixed salads call for something akin to engineering skill. A man sizes up his resources. Is his capon freshly boiled, the elite of juicy eating? Do the crab lumps literally measure up to lump-size meat, or are they merely flakes? Do the celery hearts crackle with freshness when they fall under his French knife? A man won't waver if he must use shallots instead of chives or substitute smoked ham for smoked turkey. A man can distinguish between hot and cold—in the winter he wants his black bean soup hot on his tongue, but in the summer he insists that his salad have the same thermometrical effect as the cracked ice in his planter's punch or a tall, thin glass of freshly poured ale. The following recipes, each of which serves four, are a sample of some of the world-wide gambits available to the internationally oriented gourmet of superior saladry.

[recipe_title]Italian Squid Salad[/recipe_title]

[recipe]2 lbs. baby squid[/recipe]

[recipe]Olive oil[/recipe]

[recipe]Juice of 1/2 lemon[/recipe]

[recipe]2 celery hearts, thinly sliced[/recipe]

[recipe]1 tablespoon finely chopped fresh mint[/recipe]

[recipe]2 scallions, thinly sliced[/recipe]

[recipe]1 tablespoon finely minced parsley[/recipe]

[recipe]Salt, pepper, celery salt[/recipe]

[recipe]1/2 cup mayonnaise[/recipe]

[recipe]2 tablespoons wine vinegar[/recipe]

[recipe]2 teaspoons anchovy paste[/recipe]

[recipe]Boston lettuce[/recipe]

[recipe]2 hard-boiled eggs[/recipe]

[recipe]2 firm, ripe tomatoes[/recipe]

Clean squid, discarding head, insides and cartilage. Wash well in cold water and remove skin. Bring a large pot of salted water to a rapid boil. Add squid and boil until tender (about 1-1/2 hour). Drain. When cool enough to handle, cut into 3/4-in. dice. Place in mixing bowl with 1/4 cup olive oil, lemon juice, celery hearts, mint, scallions and parsley. Mix well, adding salt, pepper and celery salt to taste. Marinate in refrigerator overnight. In another bowl combine mayonnaise, I tablespoon olive oil, wine vinegar and anchovy paste. Mix with wire whip until smooth. Line a platter with leaves of Boston lettuce. Pile squid salad in center. Place alternate slices of tomato and egg, both thinly sliced, overlapping slightly, around salad. Pour mayonnaise mixture over tomatoes and eggs.

[recipe_title]Hungarian Corned Beef, Potato and Sauerkraut Salad[/recipe_title]

[recipe]3/4 lb. sliced, freshly cooked delicatessen corned beef[/recipe]

[recipe]2 lbs. potatoes[/recipe]

[recipe]1/2 cup light cream[/recipe]

[recipe]2 teaspoons Dusseldorf mustard[/recipe]

[recipe]2 tablespoons garlic-flavored wine vinegar[/recipe]

[recipe]Salad oil[/recipe]

[recipe]1/4 cup mayonnaise[/recipe]

[recipe]Salt, pepper, paprika[/recipe]

[recipe]1-1/2 lbs. sauerkraut[/recipe]

[recipe]1 medium-size onion[/recipe]

[recipe]1-1/2 cups sour cream[/recipe]

[recipe]2 teaspoons caraway seeds[/recipe]

Boil potatoes in jackets until just tender; don't overcook. Remove jackets while potatoes are still warm and cut potatoes into slices about 1/4 in. thick and about 1 in. in diameter. In a mixing bowl combine cream, mustard, vinegar, 1 tablespoon salad oil and mayonnaise. Stir well with wire whip. Cut corned beef into pieces 1/2 to 3/4 in. square and add, along with potatoes, to bowl. Toss thoroughly. Add salt and pepper to taste. If a more tart salad is desired, add vinegar to taste. Lightly oil an 8-1/2-in. ring mold. Press outer and inner edges to pack ingredients tightly. Chill in refrigerator at least 2 hours, longer if possible. Drain sauerkraut, pressing with hand to remove as much juice as possible. Peel onion, and cut through stem end into halves; cut crosswise into thinnest possible slices and separate slices into strips. Put caraway seeds in well of electric blender; blend at high speed 1 minute. In a bowl combine sauerkraut, onion, sour cream, caraway and 3 tablespoons cold water. Mix very well. Chill in refrigerator. Unmold corned-beef mixture onto large round plate or platter. Pile sauerkraut mixture in center of ring. Sprinkle sauerkraut generously with paprika.

[recipe_title]French Cold Salpicon of Lobster[/recipe_title]

[recipe]4 boiled 1-1/2-lb. fresh lobsters[/recipe]

[recipe]1/2 lb. fresh mushrooms[/recipe]

[recipe]1/2 cup celery, small dice[/recipe]

[recipe]Mayonnaise[/recipe]

[recipe]1 teaspoon Dijon mustard[/recipe]

[recipe]Juice of 1/4 lemon[/recipe]

[recipe]7/8-oz. tin brushed truffles, finely chopped[/recipe]

[recipe]1 teaspoon finely chopped chives[/recipe]

[recipe]1 tablespoon finely chopped parsley[/recipe]

[recipe]Salt, pepper, celery salt[/recipe]

[recipe]Boston lettuce[/recipe]

Cut each lobster in half. Remove sac (concluded on page 187) Salads (continued from page 112) in back of head. Separate claws from body and remove the ends of claws from shells, keeping meat intact. Chill in refrigerator. Cut balance of claw meat and balance of lobster meat into 1/4-in. cubes. Cut mushrooms into same size. In mixing bowl combine diced lobster, mushrooms, celery, 1/2 cup mayonnaise, mustard, lemon juice, truffles, chives and parsley. Mix well, adding salt, pepper and celery salt to taste. Chill in refrigerator at least 1 hour. Line four 5-in. scallop shells with leaves of lettuce. Pile lobster mixture on lettuce. Place 1 tablespoon mayonnaise on top of each. Place 2 claw ends on top of mayonnaise. Chill until serving time.

[recipe_title]Greek Tossed Salad with Feta Cheese[/recipe_title]

[recipe]1 quart salad greens, torn into 1-in. pieces[/recipe]

[recipe]8 anchovies[/recipe]

[recipe]8 Calamata olives[/recipe]

[recipe]8-oz. jar tiny stuffed eggplants[/recipe]

[recipe]4-oz. jar tiny artichoke hearts in oil[/recipe]

[recipe]1 green pepper[/recipe]

[recipe]8-oz. can sliced beets[/recipe]

[recipe]2 ozs. shelled pine nuts[/recipe]

[recipe]3 minced cloves garlic[/recipe]

[recipe]1/2 cup olive oil[/recipe]

[recipe]Juice of 1 lemon[/recipe]

[recipe]1 medium-size potato, boiled and mashed (no milk)[/recipe]

[recipe]2 firm, ripe tomatoes, cut into eighths[/recipe]

[recipe]1/2 cucumber, thinly sliced[/recipe]

[recipe]1/2 1b. feta cheese, crumbled[/recipe]

[recipe]Salt, pepper[/recipe]

Be sure salad greens are well dried. Drain anchovies, olives, eggplants and artichoke hearts well. (Do not use drained oil for salad.) Cut green pepper in half lengthwise. Remove seeds and stem. Cut crosswise into thin slices. Drain beets. Put pine nuts and garlic in electric blender and blend until nuts are finely chopped. Slowly add oil and lemon juice while blending at low speed. Add potato and blend until smooth. Chill dressing thoroughly. In large bowl put salad greens, anchovies, olives, eggplants, artichoke hearts, green pepper, tomatoes, cucumber and feta cheese. Add dressing and toss well. Add salt and pepper to taste. Place beets on top of salad.

[recipe_title]American Avocado and Crab Meat Salad[/recipe_title]

[recipe]1 1b. fresh or canned crab meat[/recipe]

[recipe]3-oz. package slivered almonds[/recipe]

[recipe]1 tablespoon salad oil[/recipe]

[recipe]2 large ripe, firm avocados[/recipe]

[recipe]Juice of 1 lemon[/recipe]

[recipe]1/4 green pepper, finely minced[/recipe]

[recipe]1 piece celery, finely minced[/recipe]

[recipe]1 small onion, grated[/recipe]

[recipe]2/3 cup mayonnaise[/recipe]

[recipe]2 tablespoons dark sherry[/recipe]

[recipe]Salt, pepper[/recipe]

[recipe]1 bunch watercress[/recipe]

[recipe]French dressing[/recipe]

Carefully remove any cartilage or pieces of shell from crab meat. Chill thoroughly. Place almonds in shallow pan or pie plate. Add salad oil and mix well. Place pan in oven preheated at 350°. Heat until almonds are light brown; avoid scorching. Set aside to cool. Cut each avocado in half lengthwise. Remove seeds. With sharp paring knife remove avocado shells, keeping each half intact. Sprinkle avocados, inside and outside, with lemon juice to prevent discoloration. In a mixing bowl combine green pepper, celery, onion, mayonnaise and sherry. Mix well. Add crab meat and mix well. Add salt and pepper to taste. In another bowl toss watercress with about 2 tablespoons French dressing. Place watercress on four serving plates. Place avocado half in center of each plate. Pile crab-meat mixture into avocados and top with almonds.

[recipe_title]Chinese Chicken and Bamboo Shoot Salad[/recipe_title]

[recipe]2 whole chicken breasts[/recipe]

[recipe]Salad oil[/recipe]

[recipe]1-1b. can bamboo shoots[/recipe]

[recipe]2 teaspoons sesame oil[/recipe]

[recipe]2 tablespoons soy sauce[/recipe]

[recipe]1/4 cup cider vinegar[/recipe]

[recipe]2 teaspoons sugar[/recipe]

[recipe]1/4 teaspoon powdered ginger[/recipe]

[recipe]1/8 teaspoon cinnamon[/recipe]

[recipe]1 clove garlic, finely minced[/recipe]

[recipe]1 small onion[/recipe]

[recipe]2 hard-boiled eggs[/recipe]

[recipe]3 cups Chinese cabbage, 1/4-in. diagonal strips[/recipe]

[recipe]1 cup celery, 1/4-in. diagonal strips[/recipe]

Remove chicken meat from bone or have butcher bone chicken breasts beforehand. Discard skin. Cut each breast into 1/4-in. slices. In a heavy skillet heat 3 tablespoons salad oil. Add chicken and sauté until tender, about 5 min., stirring constantly. Don't overcook. Chill in refrigerator. Drain bamboo shoots, pressing to remove liquid. Chill well. In well of blender put 2 tablespoons salad oil, sesame oil, soy sauce, vinegar, sugar, ginger, cinnamon and garlic. Blend at high speed 30 seconds. Chill well. Peel onion and cut in half through stem end; cut crosswise into thinnest possible slices and separate slices into strips. Separate egg whites from yolks. Chop each separately and set aside. In mixing bowl combine chicken, Chinese cabbage, celery, bamboo shoots and onion. Just before serving add soy-sauce dressing, tossing well. Pile mixture onto platter. Sprinkle egg whites over salad, covering top thoroughly. Sprinkle egg yolks over center of salad. Serve at once.

These recipes are only a few stopovers on a global tour of adventurous eating. The ports of call are as endless as they are exciting. Bon voyage.