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Why do people get excited about salads?


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Old 29-04-2010, 09:26
Inkblot
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I'm a vegetarian but I find salad really uninteresting. I don't much like the feel of lettuce in my mouth (a bit fingernails-on-blackboardy) and there isn't really a lot of flavour unless you put dressing on it. Also, unless you make them hours in advance they're far too cold.

What's the attraction of salads? If I enjoyed eating them I might lose weight but if the only way to make them interesting is to eat them with oil, bread and butter, cheese etc that's not going to happen.
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Old 29-04-2010, 09:39
josiemumbo
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Do people get excited about them? Your'e right though, salads are nice with the added extras like bacon or avocado, or mayo or an oily dressing
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Old 29-04-2010, 09:44
Inkblot
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Yes, people do rave about them. I was just reading another forum where someone said: "Salads - my kind of food!"
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Old 29-04-2010, 09:46
Elanor
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I get excited about salads! To my mind, lettuce is only a very minor ingredient. Anyway, I prefer spinach leaves or spinach and rocket, and then I add loads of stuff, depending on what I've got in. But usually spring onion, tomato (cherry ones, or baby plum, cut in half) and blue cheese, and dried cranberries, pecans or walnuts or toasted pine nuts, some sunflower seeds, sometimes avocado, or tangerine segments, or bits of artichoke, maybe a sliced hardboiled egg, sliced pear or apple... THAT'S a salad to me.

It really annoys me in pubs and so on when something is served with a "side salad" - and it turns out to be a wedge of iceberg, a tomato cut in half and some thick chunks of cucumber.
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Old 29-04-2010, 09:50
josiemumbo
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growing up, when salad just involved limp lettuce, tomatos and cucumber, yes, pretty boring, but some pepper, radishes, red cabbage livens it up, but then only with something fattening and creamy
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Old 29-04-2010, 11:25
minty82
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growing up, when salad just involved limp lettuce, tomatos and cucumber, yes, pretty boring, but some pepper, radishes, red cabbage livens it up, but then only with something fattening and creamy
Doesn't have to be fattening though. I make a warm salad out of over roasted veg which is drzzled with olive oil and sprinkled with thyme and oregano. Whilst still warm, sprinkle with a little balsamic and then mix all the juices out of the veg with a squeeze of lemon juice and the roasted garlic that has been in with the veg, and you have a lovely dressing to drizzle over some nice rocket/chard/spinach and your warm veg. You could add chicken, haloumi, new potatoes or avacado to bulk it out if you wished, or even some cous cous.
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Old 29-04-2010, 12:10
Teddybleads
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I suppose part of the attrcation is thet there are so many interesting lettuces available today. In my youth you either had the tastless iceberg or the often-bitter cos.
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Old 29-04-2010, 12:18
stud u like
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growing up, when salad just involved limp lettuce, tomatos and cucumber, yes, pretty boring, but some pepper, radishes, red cabbage livens it up, but then only with something fattening and creamy
Liven it up with diced beetroot,grated carrot and vinaigrette and that isn't fattening yet tastes like it does.
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Old 29-04-2010, 12:27
Ignazio
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I prefer watercress to lettuce - but I do need something to bulk it out e.g. new potatoes tossed in olive oil, garlic and rosemary; homemade coleslaw and perhaps a rice salad.
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Old 29-04-2010, 12:39
Darthchaffinch
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I used to hate Salads when I was young for most of the above negative points.

Then I learned to cook (home and a restaurant as holiday job) and learnt how to make them properly; Jamie oliver's recent tomato and chorizo salad is a great example of a great salad (recipe not online but this is almost it):
http://paganum.wordpress.com/2010/04...chorizo-salad/

Made it at the weekend for family and it went down v. well.
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Old 29-04-2010, 15:04
ikkleosu
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I always liked salads but for about the first 25 years never had a dressing, other than salad cream. Once I discovered dressings I loved them even more. My favourite is a homemade mix which is olive oil, baslasmic, garlic, mustard and honey. Sometimes I'll just shove random stuff in it and it's grogeous. even my salad hating OH will eat some salad if it had that dressing.

The other night my salad was rocket, jarred peppers, tomato, cucumber, spring onion, olives and feta. I munched it like a good un.
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Old 29-04-2010, 15:37
grassmarket
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Depends where you go - if you order a salad in France you are getting a mixture of about a dozen different ingredients, many of which have more calories in them than a super-sized Big Mac.
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Old 29-04-2010, 16:10
mrs_buckley
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I do enjoy a nice salad, paricularly on a sunny day. For me it's lettuce, tomatoes (either cherry or baby plum), cucumber, spring onions, ham, cheese, pickled onions and pickled beetroot, occasionally some raw peppers, and ready salted crisps OR a slice or two of bread. Yummy!
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Old 29-04-2010, 16:24
Russ_WWFC
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Can't say I am that fussed about salad, normally I'll have a few bits of tomato and onion and that's it
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Old 29-04-2010, 18:19
TommyGavin76
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It's very hard to make a nice salad without making it fattening. The best salad I ever had was a Caesar in the U.S. but it was covered in dressing and had massive croutons in it!
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Old 29-04-2010, 18:43
freakyogre777
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Probably the same reason people get excited about other types of food, they enjoy them.

I like salad and don't particularly like a dressing on it, you just need to add what you like as I agree, it is hard to get excited about a piece of lettuce (although I could eat iceberg as it is and often do :P)

I made up a tub of salad this week for lunches and added the usual lettuce, tomatoes, cucumber, carrot, then sweetcorn, cooked rice, hard boiled egg, red onion and last night I added some cooked chicken for todays lunch. Yummy.
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Old 29-04-2010, 19:19
Inkblot
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Probably the same reason people get excited about other types of food, they enjoy them.
Well, yeah, I did understand that much. What I don't understand is why people enjoy them. I take the point that if you put a lot of different things that you like into a salad then you'll like the salad, but I still don't really get why people bother. You could just eat all the bits you like and leave out the cold, tasteless lettuce, cucumber etc (and probably tomatoes since they often lack flavour).

What I like is more like mezze, with olives, roast vegetables, halloumi, maybe couscous, avocados, grilled aubergines, humous, pitta etc. But not all mixed up in a bowl.
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Old 29-04-2010, 19:27
Miriams Sister
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We love salads too, iceberg or round lettuce, english tomatoes, giant spring onions sliced, sliced cucumber, sliced celery and my favourite - radishes.
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Old 29-04-2010, 19:33
kimindex
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We had potato salad (home-made), with a salad of feta, fresh broad beans, spring onions, cucumber, crunchy lettuce and garlic croutons with no dressing the other day and it was lovely (so much so we're having it again on Sunday). Depends on the salad. I'd also highly recommend watercress, water melon and halloumi. There's loads that can be done with salad.
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Old 29-04-2010, 19:56
hastalavegan
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I take the point that if you put a lot of different things that you like into a salad then you'll like the salad, but I still don't really get why people bother. You could just eat all the bits you like and leave out the cold, tasteless lettuce, cucumber etc (and probably tomatoes since they often lack flavour).
Well I don't put ingredients I don't like into my salads, so I don't have that problem

I rarely have salad, but when I get cravings for it I eat tons of the stuff. I usually have spinach leaves, cashew nuts, pepper, grated carrot, red onion, avocado, vegan cheese, raisins and olives. Then I just splash on some olive oil and balsamic vinegar.
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Old 29-04-2010, 20:24
therightdeal
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Salads are lovely, especially with a nice ham, or a chicken salad.
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Old 29-04-2010, 21:47
hobbes
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pink and sweaty wet processed ham rolled into tubes, pickled beetroot crinkle cut slices, pink vinegary juices leeching into the pallid white ham fat. Half a tomato in wedges and some slices of bitter old cucumber with the skin serated by scraping a fork down it.

A hard boiled egg, slightly grey in the middle sat on its own with a blob of salad cream. Flat green lettuce dressed with malt vinegar and sugar. A peppery radish from the garden with a faint hint of soil.

Bread and marge in triangles on the side. A plate of window cake for afters.

Saturday tea seventies style
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Old 29-04-2010, 22:02
kimindex
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pink and sweaty wet processed ham rolled into tubes, pickled beetroot crinkle cut slices, pink vinegary juices leeching into the pallid white ham fat. Half a tomato in wedges and some slices of bitter old cucumber with the skin serated by scraping a fork down it.

A hard boiled egg, slightly grey in the middle sat on its own with a blob of salad cream. Flat green lettuce dressed with malt vinegar and sugar. A peppery radish from the garden with a faint hint of soil.

Bread and marge in triangles on the side. A plate of window cake for afters.

Saturday tea seventies style
I can vouch for that! I used to dread going to some aunties in the summer.
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Old 29-04-2010, 22:20
cheesenmarmite
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pink and sweaty wet processed ham rolled into tubes, pickled beetroot crinkle cut slices, pink vinegary juices leeching into the pallid white ham fat. Half a tomato in wedges and some slices of bitter old cucumber with the skin serated by scraping a fork down it.

A hard boiled egg, slightly grey in the middle sat on its own with a blob of salad cream. Flat green lettuce dressed with malt vinegar and sugar. A peppery radish from the garden with a faint hint of soil.

Bread and marge in triangles on the side. A plate of window cake for afters.

Saturday tea seventies style
Ha ha!

Have you read Nigel Slater's "Eating for England"? This could have been taken straight out of it!
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Old 29-04-2010, 22:22
tangsman
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Just had an Italian style salad (added tomatoes, a hard boiled egg, some beetroot, grated parmesan and a light French dressing) to accompany some sandwich steak. Washed it all down with a Grolsch Beugel.

Lovely.
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