24.1 Salad greens

Salad greens are leafy vegetables, though not all of them are green: there are white, yellow, red and brown ones too. Most belong to one of two families, the lettuces or the chicories. Leafy greens that are usually cooked, such as mustard greens, are covered with the other vegetables. see chapter 17: Greens

Lettuces

Lettuce has been eaten for almost as long as anyone has written down what people ate. Archaeologists found that Persian kings were served it at banquets more than 2,500 years ago. Lettuces belong to the genus Lactuca, and the four common types are butterhead, crisphead, leaf and romaine.

• Boston and Bibb are the best-known butterhead lettuces. Their leaves are soft, bendy and pale green, and both their feel and their taste are buttery. Boston is the larger and paler of the two. Pulled off the head, the leaves curl into cups that can hold other foods on a cold plate.
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• Iceberg is a crisphead lettuce, and in the United States it outsells every other kind put together. The head is a tight ball of pale green leaves, crisp and very mild in taste, and it stays crisp a long time after it is cut. Choose heads that feel firm but not hard, with no burnt or rusty tips on the leaves.
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• Leaf lettuce, red or green, grows as a loose bunch of separate leaves with ruffled edges, all joined to one stalk. With no firm head to protect it, it is easily damaged between the field and the kitchen. The leaves are tender, mild and brightly colored. Good leaf lettuce has well-shaped leaves with no bruises, tears or brown spots.
• Romaine, also called cos, forms a loose, long head, and each leaf has a thick rib down the middle. The dark outer leaves look coarse, yet they are crisp, tender and tasty, not bitter; the paler leaves inside are softer but still crisp. Romaine has enough flavor of its own to stand up to a strong dressing, such as the garlic and Parmesan of a Caesar salad. Look for dark outer leaves with no marks or yellowing.
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Baby greens and micro greens

Chefs hunting for something new made baby lettuces and other speciality greens popular. A baby green tastes like the grown plant, only gentler: it is often less bitter and always more tender. Their small size and wide range make them a good fit for composed salads. Mesclun is a mix of several kinds of baby lettuce.

Micro greens are smaller still. They are the first true leaves of nearly any green you can eat, such as lettuce, spinach or kale. They are so fragile that they are picked and packed by hand, and chefs like them as a garnish on main-course and appetizer plates.

Chicories

Chicories come in many colors, shapes and sizes. Most taste a little bitter, and they are sturdy enough to cook, usually by grilling or braising. see chapter 10: The basic steps

• Belgian endive is the shoot of a chicory root. It grows as a small, tight head of pointed leaves, white at the base with yellow edges and tips; a purple-tipped kind is sometimes sold. Whole leaves can be trimmed and stuffed with a soft cheese, butter or spread as an hors d'oeuvre, or set into a composed salad, and cut or whole leaves go into cold salads. Whole heads are often braised or grilled to serve with meat or poultry. It is imported from Belgium, and California now grows a commercial crop as well.
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• Curly endive is often called chicory, its family name, in the United States, or frisée, its French name. Its dark outer leaves are pointed, sturdy and a little bitter; the yellow leaves in the center are softer and milder. Its strong taste suits strong cheese, game and citrus, and it is often mixed into other greens for texture and flavor.
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• Escarole, sometimes called broadleaf endive, has thick, slightly bitter leaves, green outside and pale green or yellow in the middle. It is very sturdy. Mixed with other greens it adds texture, its flavor holds up under a full-flavored dressing, and it goes well with grilled meat and poultry.
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• Radicchio looks like a small red cabbage and keeps its red color when cooked, so it is often braised or grilled as a side dish. Its color makes it popular raw in cold salads, but it tastes very bitter: use a little, mixed with other greens. The leaves come apart as cups that can hold other parts of a composed salad. It is expensive, and sometimes hard to get.
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Other leaves and sprouts

• Arugula, also called rocket, belongs to the cabbage family. Its leaves are about the shape and size of broad dandelion leaves, and leaves 2 to 4 inches (5 to 10 cm) long are the best. The taste is so strongly spicy and peppery that it is seldom served alone; mix it with other greens to give them bite.
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• Dandelion grows as a weed across most of the United States. Its leaves are long, thin and toothed, with a strong rib down the middle. For a salad, buy small leaves, which are more tender and less bitter. Cook the older, tougher ones as a vegetable.
• Mâche, or lamb's lettuce, has small, curved leaves, pale to dark green, that are very tender and taste mild and slightly nutty. Because it is so delicate, pair it only with other gentle greens such as Boston or Bibb, and dress it sparingly with a light vinaigrette.
• Sorrel, sometimes called sour grass, looks like spinach in color and leaf shape but tastes sharply tart and lemony, which suits fish and shellfish. Use it sparingly, mixed with other greens. It also makes soups, sauces and purées.
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• Spinach can be cooked or eaten raw. As a salad leaf it is deep green, rich-tasting and tender, and a hot bacon dressing is a favorite with it. Good spinach is fairly crisp; pass over bunches that are wilted or yellow.
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• Watercress has tiny leaves, about the size of a dime, on thick stems, and its peppery taste brings spice to a salad. Fresh watercress is dark green with no yellow. It must be kept very cold and damp, so it usually arrives with ice packed on top. Pick the leaves off the stems and rinse them just before service.
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• Sprouts are not true salad greens, but they are used like them in salads and sandwiches. They are the very young plants of alfalfa, which tastes mild and sweet, or of daikon or mustard, both of which taste peppery. Every kind of raw sprout, such as bean, alfalfa or radish, counts as a potentially hazardous food. see chapter 2: Potentially hazardous foods

Edible flowers and herbs

Speciality growers sell edible blossoms raised without pesticides, for salads and for garnish wherever a plate needs color. Some, such as nasturtiums, calendulas and pansies, are grown just to be eaten. Others, such as squash blossoms and yellow cucumber flowers, come as a by-product of growing vegetables. How to use them depends on their size: see chapter 4: Sticks: julienne and batonnet

• Cut squash blossoms and other very large flowers into julienne strips before they go into a salad.
• Pull the petals from large and medium flowers.
• Toss small whole flowers through a salad, or use them to garnish a composed one.
• Scatter very small flowers and petals on top, where the greens will not hide them.

Fresh herbs bring interest to a plain salad: dill, basil, mint, thyme, oregano, tarragon, cilantro, sage, marjoram, savory and even rosemary. Many of them are strong, so use them sparingly and let the gentle taste of the greens come through. Cut leafy herbs, such as sage and basil, with a knife; pick other herbs off their stems or chop them before tossing them with the greens. Chive blossoms and other flowering herbs work the way edible flowers do, for color, flavor and aroma. see chapter 20: Herbs

What greens give you

On their own, greens carry almost no fat and few calories, and plenty of vitamins A and C, iron and fiber. Meat, cheese and dressings, many of them made with oil, add fat and calories back, so a kitchen should also offer low-fat or fat-free dressings.

Buying greens

Lettuce grows almost everywhere in the United States, and almost every kind is sold all year. Spinach is too, while many speciality greens are seasonal. Lettuce usually comes 24 heads to a case, the weight varying; other greens come in trays or boxes of many sizes.

Greens are only washed before they are eaten, so they must be as fresh and unmarked as you can get them. Buy them every day if possible. The leaves should look fresh, with no yellowing, and heads should feel heavy, their outer leaves hardly damaged.

Many greens can be bought already cut and washed, often vacuum-packed so they keep longer; delicate kinds may instead come loose in boxes of 5 to 10 pounds (2 to 5 kilograms). They cost more, but they can save a great deal of labor.

Storing greens

Every salad green spoils quickly, though a few sturdy kinds keep for a week or more when stored well. Soft-leaved greens such as Boston and Bibb usually go off sooner than crisp ones such as iceberg and romaine.

Keep greens in the cartons they arrived in, in a refrigerator set aside for them. Refrigerated food is kept at 4°C (39°F) or colder, and most produce, greens included, between 2°C and 4°C (36°F and 39°F).

Do not store greens next to tomatoes, apples or other fruit that gives off ethylene gas. The gas makes greens wilt and spoil faster. see chapter 17: Respiration and ripening

Wash greens only when you need them, because extra water makes them break down fast; moisture on any vegetable softens it and starts it rotting. Greens that have wilted a little can often be brought back with a soak of up to an hour in chilled water, then draining them and keeping them in the refrigerator until they are crisp.

Tearing, washing and drying

Unless greens come cut and washed, they need four jobs before service: tearing, cutting, washing and drying. Some chefs want every leaf torn by hand. Tearing suits delicate greens such as butterhead and baby lettuces, which look better and bruise less that way. But tearing everything is often not practical, and cutting hardy greens with a knife is perfectly fine. Kitchen scissors are handy for small leaves and fresh herbs.

Wash every green before use, even one that looks clean: insects, sand, soil and pesticides can hide in the leaves. Tear or cut first, then wash. A whole head can be dipped again and again in cold water and drained, but this is not a good idea. It misses anything trapped near the center, and water caught between the leaves makes them spoil sooner.

Then dry the greens well. Wet leaves lose their crispness sooner, push oily dressings away and water down their flavor. Drain them in a colander and blot them with a clean cloth or paper towels, or, better, spin them in a salad spinner, which throws the water off.

Raw greens get no cooking after they are washed. Such ready-to-eat food is especially risky, because nothing later kills germs that a worker's hands put on it. To keep it safe: see chapter 2: Cross-contamination and allergens

• Wash your hands properly.
• Where you can, handle ready-to-eat food with utensils or gloves rather than bare hands.
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• Give raw foods and ready-to-eat foods their own boards, knives, cloths and sinks, or wash and sanitize them between uses.
• Prepare ready-to-eat foods at the start of the day, before any raw food.

What a dressing is

A dressing is a salad's sauce. Like a sauce for hot food, it should bring out the main food, not cover it up. Most dressings start from one of two bases: oil and vinegar, called a vinaigrette, or mayonnaise or some other emulsified sauce. A vinaigrette made without oil, or a creamy dressing that swaps the mayonnaise for buttermilk, yogurt or sour cream, is still made the same way as the two classics.

• egg yolk, which holds lecithin
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• whole egg
• paprika
• dry mustard

Dressings can be sorted by how long the emulsion lasts.

How each is made:

• True French dressing is just oil, cider vinegar and seasonings, shaken in a jar right before serving.
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• Modified French dressing has dissolved gelatin beaten in.
• Fruit salad dressing is first cooked with flour and vinegar until thick, then cooled before the oil is beaten in.
• Cooked salad dressing boils cornstarch, water and vinegar for one minute, then cools to about 55°C so that the egg will not set when it goes in, before egg and then oil are blended in.

Vinaigrette

The plainest vinaigrette, which some call basic French dressing, is just oil and vinegar with salt and pepper, a temporary emulsion. The usual proportion is three parts oil for each part vinegar, but it moves. A strongly flavored oil needs less. A mild or sweet vinegar such as balsamic may need less oil too. When citrus juice takes the place of some or all of the vinegar, you may need more than one part of acid. Taste to decide, best of all on the food the dressing is for.

Match the oil to the vinegar: olive oil with red wine vinegar, a nut oil with white wine or sherry vinegar, a neutral oil such as canola, corn or safflower with a flavored vinegar. Oil and vinegar pull apart almost as soon as they are mixed, so whisk them together right before use. see chapter 19: Flavor against price

The oils and acids most used in dressings:

• Light, neutral oils such as corn, canola, soybean, safflower and cottonseed are cheap and widely used.
• Olive oil is a favorite, both mild pure olive oil and the full-flavored extra virgin.
• Hazelnut and walnut oils cost more but bring flavors of their own, and infused oils are popular.
• Red wine vinegar is used most, because it is cheap and goes with many foods.
• Cider, balsamic and white wine vinegars are common too, and so are fruit vinegars (raspberry above all), herb vinegars and garlic vinegars.
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• Lemon, orange or lime juice can replace some or all of the vinegar.

To flavor your own vinegar, put fruit, herbs or garlic into red or white wine vinegar, leave it several days, then strain it. Mince or chop herbs, shallots and garlic before they go into a dressing; spices, mustard, sugar and the like can go in at any point. With dried herbs, let the dressing stand at least an hour so their flavor comes out.

Mayonnaise

Most kitchens buy their mayonnaise. Knowing how it is made still matters: it shows you how mayonnaise behaves when you use it, and it lets you flavor your own exactly as you want.

Whisking oil into a little vinegar breaks the oil into tiny droplets with a thin film of vinegar between them. It is the water in the vinegar that will not mix with oil. Left alone, the droplets would soon run back together into a pool of oil and a pool of vinegar. Lecithin, from the egg yolk, stops that: it can join with both oil and water, so it wraps each droplet and keeps the droplets apart. The vinegar's acid helps form the emulsion as well. see chapter 15: What eggs do in a recipe

The balance of oil, vinegar, yolk and whipping decides the result. More oil against the vinegar gives a thicker sauce; more vinegar gives a thinner one. One yolk holds enough lecithin for about 7 fluid ounces (200 milliliters) of oil. Go past that and the sauce breaks: oil and vinegar part, and the mayonnaise turns thin. To rescue it, beat the broken sauce slowly into a fresh yolk or into some ready-made mayonnaise, about 7 fluid ounces (210 milliliters) of broken sauce to one yolk or to 4 fluid ounces (120 milliliters) of mayonnaise, scaled to the size of the batch. Some chefs add ½ fluid ounce (15 milliliters) of boiling water to every 7 ounces (200 milliliters) of finished mayonnaise to help it hold.

To make mayonnaise:

• Bring every ingredient to room temperature. Ingredients at room temperature emulsify more easily than cold ones.
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• Whip the yolks on high speed, by hand, in a mixer or in a food processor, until frothy.
• Whip in the seasonings, usually dry mustard, salt, pepper and lemon juice. Salt dissolves better now than in the finished sauce.
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• Whip in a little of the liquid, such as the vinegar.
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• Whisking hard, or with the mixer on high, start the oil at a bare trickle and keep it there until the emulsion takes. After that, the oil can go a little faster, still in a slow, steady stream, and the mixer can run a little slower.
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• The sauce thickens as the oil goes in. Add oil and liquid by turns, two or three rounds of each, until the oil is used up and the texture is right.
• Taste, correct the seasoning, and refrigerate at once.

A neutral vegetable oil and wine vinegar make a standard mayonnaise; other oils and vinegars change its flavor. Olive oil makes aioli, a strong garlic mayonnaise, and a flavored vinegar such as tarragon gives a mayonnaise of its own. Mayonnaise-based dressings start from mayonnaise and add things such as buttermilk, sour cream, vinegar, fruit juice, puréed or minced vegetables, tomato paste, garlic, onion, herbs, spices, condiments, capers, anchovies or boiled eggs.

An emulsified vinaigrette is a vinaigrette held together with whole eggs. It is thinner and lighter than a mayonnaise dressing but heavier than a plain vinaigrette. It tastes much like a plain one, yet it does not separate and it clings easily to leaves. Make it the way you make mayonnaise:

• Bring the ingredients to room temperature.
• Whip the eggs frothy.
• Add the dry ingredients and flavorings such as garlic, shallots and herbs.
• Add a little liquid.
• Add oil very slowly until the emulsion takes, then faster, by turns with the liquid.
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It should end much thinner than mayonnaise. If it comes out too thick, taste it, then thin it with water, vinegar or lemon juice.

Mayonnaise can be made with pasteurized whole egg. Pasteurized products, such as pasteurized liquid egg, are the safer choice wherever possible, because recipes with raw egg have caused many outbreaks and germs cannot be seen, smelled or tasted. see chapter 15: Pasteurized eggs in place of raw

Dressing and serving a green salad

A tossed salad is made from leafy greens such as spinach, lettuce, arugula, watercress or dandelion. It can be greens and dressing alone, or have fruit, vegetables, nuts or cheese added. Its dressing may be anything from a simple oil and vinegar to a rich, warm bacon dressing. Add the dressing at the last possible moment: an acid dressing makes most greens wilt and go soggy.

Match the dressing to the leaf. The more delicate the greens, the lighter and gentler the dressing should be. Vinaigrettes are far lighter than mayonnaise dressings and belong on butterhead, mâche and other tender leaves; crisp iceberg and sturdy romaine can carry a heavier, mayonnaise-based dressing.

Garnishes for a tossed salad have no real limit. Some common ones:

• almost any vegetable, whether raw, blanched or cooked through, in even sizes and shapes
• citrus segments, apple or pear, or dried fruit such as raisins, currants or apricots
• cooked meat and poultry neatly sliced or diced
• fish, poached, grilled or cured, diced or flaked
• small whole shellfish such as shrimp and scallops, or lobster and crab
• grated hard cheeses such as Asiago, Parmesan or Romano, or shredded semi-hard ones such as Cheddar and Swiss
• nuts, roasted, candied or smoked
• croutons

A composed salad is arranged on the plate rather than tossed, usually on a bed of greens. It normally has four parts:

• Base: a layer of greens lining the plate, cupped or flat for the look you want.
• Body: the main food. It may be greens, or another salad such as chicken salad or fruit.
• Garnish: added for color, texture and flavor, warm or cold, anything from a sliced grilled duck breast to a sprinkle of chopped herbs, as long as it suits and balances the body.
• Dressing: there to set off the other flavors, not to hide them. If the body is already dressed, as a bound salad is, it may need none.

Ladle the dressing over a composed salad once it is plated, or dress each part before you arrange it. On a busy service, simpler salads can be laid out on a sheet pan, misted with dressing from a spray bottle kept only for that job just before service, and lifted onto chilled plates with a spatula.

Bound, vegetable and fruit salads

A bound salad holds one or more foods together in a dressing, either a vinaigrette or a mayonnaise-type one. The foods may be cooked meat, poultry, fish or shellfish, potatoes, pasta, grains or legumes. The mix can be packed tight or loose and flaky, but every part should be spread evenly through it. Some bound salads go in sandwiches but are not served as sides, such as tuna or chicken salad. Others are sides but not fillings, such as potato or pasta salad. Any of them can be the body of a composed salad, like egg salad on a bed of greens.

Rules for a bound salad:

• Choose ingredients whose flavors blend and suit one another, and add a few bright ones for color.
• Cut every piece the same size, small enough to eat easily with a fork.
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• Leftovers are fine as long as they are fresh and good: the salad can be no better than each thing in it.
• Cook every meat, poultry, fish and shellfish properly first, since undercooked food can cause illness and spoil. Food mixtures holding poultry, eggs, meat or fish must hold an inside temperature of 74°C (165°F) or more for no less than 15 seconds.
• Chill cooked ingredients well before they go in. Warm ingredients help bacteria grow, above all in salads made with mayonnaise. The rule is that cooked food drops from 60°C (140°F) down to 20°C (68°F) in no more than 2 hours, and on down to 4°C (40°F) in no more than 4 more. see chapter 2: Heat: cooling, holding and reheating
• Use the dressing sparingly, so it lifts the other flavors instead of hiding them.
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Vegetable salads use raw or cooked vegetables, or both, on a buffet, as an appetizer, or as the salad course. Mayonnaise goes into coleslaw and carrot-raisin salad, but most vegetable salads are marinated or tossed in a vinaigrette. Almost any vegetable can be marinated. Soft ones such as mushrooms, zucchini and cucumbers go straight into a cold marinade. Hard ones such as carrots and cauliflower are first blanched in salted water, refreshed and drained. Several hours to overnight is usually long enough for the flavors to blend. see chapter 17: Blanch first, finish later

Vegetables simmered briefly in a marinade with lemon juice and olive oil, then served cold, are prepared à la grecque. Carrots, artichokes, mushrooms, cauliflower, zucchini and pearl onions are typical.

The order of work for a vegetable salad:

• Wash.
• Trim and cut.
• Blanch or cook if needed.
• Combine with the marinade or dressing and adjust the seasoning.

Cooked vegetables count as potentially hazardous. Food kept chilled longer than 24 hours is labeled with the day it was made and a "serve by" date, and potentially hazardous foods are generally discarded three days after they were made. Many marinated salads last several days in the refrigerator. They also change as they sit: mushrooms and artichokes gain flavor, while the acid dulls the color of green vegetables. Check made-ahead salads for both looks and seasoning at service.

Fruit salads are quick to make and bright on a buffet, as a first course or, made more elaborate, as a light lunch. Make them as near to service as you can: much cut fruit turns soft and see-through if it waits, and apples, bananas and peaches brown within minutes of cutting. A dressing, if there is one, is usually sweet: fruit juice or purée stirred into honey or yogurt. Or a liqueur such as Grand Marnier or crème de menthe can be sprinkled over instead. A fruit salad can be tossed or composed. see chapter 18: Preserved fruit