Salad
A dish of mixed ingredients, often vegetables, served with dressing.
A salad is a dish consisting of mixed ingredients, frequently vegetables, typically served chilled or at room temperature, though some can be served warm. Condiments called salad dressings, which exist in a variety of flavors (generally savory), are usually used to make a salad. Garden salads have a base of raw leafy greens such as lettuce, arugula, kale or spinach; they are common enough that the word salad alone often refers specifically to garden salads. Other types include caprese salad, bean salad, tuna salad, bread salads, vegetable salads without leafy greens, rice-, pasta- and noodle-based salads, fruit salads and dessert salads.
- Etymology origin
- Latin salata (salted), from sal (salt)
- First English use
- 14th century as 'salad' or 'sallet'
- Common base
- Raw leafy greens (lettuce, arugula, kale, spinach)
Lore & Background
The word 'salad' comes to English first as 'salad' or 'sallet' in the 14th century, derived from the French salade, itself an abbreviated form of the earlier Vulgar Latin herba salata (salted herb), from the Latin salata (salted), from sal (salt) because vegetables were seasoned with brine or salty oil-and-vinegar dressings during Roman times. Ancient Greeks and Romans ate mixed greens with dressing, a type of mixed salad. Salads have been popular in Europe since the Greek and Roman imperial expansions. Mary, Queen of Scots, ate boiled celery root over greens covered with creamy mustard dressing, truffles, chervil, and slices of hard-boiled eggs. Oil used on salads can be found in ancient Greece and ancient Rome, and also in the 17th-century colony of New Netherland. A list of common items arriving on ships included 'a can of salad oil at 1.10 florins' and 'an anker of wine vinegar at 16 florins'.
Reader's Guide
Salads are a versatile dish category that can be served at any point during a meal: as appetizer salads (light, smaller-portion salads served as the first course), side salads (to accompany the main course, such as potato salad and coleslaw), main course salads (usually containing high-protein foods like eggs, legumes, or cheese), and dessert salads (sweet salads containing fruit, gelatin, sweeteners or whipped cream). When a sauce is used to flavor a salad, it is generally called a dressing; most salad dressings are based on either a mixture of oil and vinegar or a creamy dairy base. Salads may be sold in supermarkets, at restaurants and at fast food chains. In the United States, restaurants may have a salad bar with salad-making ingredients, which customers use to put together their salad. At-home salad consumption in the 2010s was rising but moving away from fresh-chopped lettuce and toward bagged greens and salad kits, with bag sales expected to reach $7 billion per year. Types of salads include green salads, wedge salads, bound salads (assembled with thick sauces such as mayonnaise, e.g. tuna salad, chicken salad, coleslaw), dinner salads (e.g. Caesar salad, chef salad, Cobb salad), fruit salads, and dessert salads (e.g. jello salad, pistachio salad, ambrosia).
Did You Know?
- The word 'salad' comes from the Latin salata (salted), because vegetables were seasoned with brine or salty oil-and-vinegar dressings during Roman times.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who is Salad in the culinary canon?
A salad is a dish of mixed ingredients—most often vegetables—typically served chilled or at room temperature, though warm versions also exist. In everyday speech, the bare word usually means a garden salad built on raw leafy greens like lettuce, arugula, kale, or spinach.
What is Salad's role and what 'powers' (varieties) does it have?
Salad functions as a versatile course or side that can range from caprese and bean preparations to tuna, pasta, rice, noodle, and bread-based versions. It is almost always finished with a savory dressing, which acts as its signature condiment.
What is Salad's origin story (etymology)?
The name traces back to Latin 'salata,' meaning salted, from the root 'sal' for salt, reflecting how early preparations were seasoned with salt. English speakers first recorded the term as 'salad' or 'sallet' in the 14th century.
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