My year in salad

Has anyone else noticed all the culinary innovation these days around the salad course? Most chefs worth their salt moved away a long time ago from salad as a throw-away. But even the overplayed microgreens with vinaigrette or beets with goat cheese are starting to be replaced with real stand-outs that I’m finding myself remembering more than the entrees and desserts. I realize some of these long pre-date 2007, but I’ve listed a few of my highlights from the year in hopes others might do the same:

- Asparagus and oyster mushroom salad with vanilla guava vinaigrette and pickled radishes: Café Bonsoiree

- Escarole salad with sherry vinaigrette, oregano, pickled shallots, black eyed peas and smoked pork: Avec

- Spring ginger salad with cabbage, carrot, sesame seeds, toasted bean, peanut, lemon juice, and crispy onion: Burma, Washington DC

- Goat cheese bavoroise with shaved beet salad and olive tapenade: Scylla

- Salad of shaved fennel, raw mushroom, and radish with lemon and white truffle oil: West Town Tavern

- Grilled seafood salad with greens, tomato, capers, and vinaigrette: Turquoise Café

- Japanese cucumber gazpacho with chilled Amish chicken salad: Zealous (at Green City Market benefit)

- Local field greens with toasted pumpkin seeds and fig vinaigrette: Spoonriver, Minneapolis

- Ground chicken salad with mint, green onion, and fish sauce: Thai Orchid, Kansas City

- Ensalada Primavera: grilled asparagus tossed with wild mushrooms, balsamic reduction, roasted garlic, crispy shallots, and tangy romesco: Mundial Cocina Mestiza

- Grilled romaine salad with purple basil dressing, olives, and white anchovy: Timo (any chance Chef Bubala might share his recipe with devoted fans on the forum? This was probably the salad highlight of the year for me, and I suspect others share the love).

ChristyP wrote:
- Escarole salad with sherry vinaigrette, oregano, pickled shallots, black eyed peas and smoked pork: Avec

I love(d) that salad (it's no longer on the menu). One of my favorite dishes of 2007. And it's a salad.

ChristyP wrote:- Salad of shaved fennel, raw mushroom, and radish with lemon and white truffle oil: West Town Tavern

On special right now is the wilted lettuce salad at West Town -- it's one of my favorites. The recipe was reprinted somewhere a few years ago and I made it for a brunch - it was the most popular item. And it's a salad.

My year in salad: Add Chicken $2.00

Last Spring, down In Charleston, SC, I had a wonderful salad at Slightly North of Broad. Field greens tossed with toasted macadmia nuts and a light house made blueberry vinagrette topped with a dollop of soft goat cheese and shaved prosciutto. I usually don't remember salads...

The Cobb Salad at Blue Bamboo in Homewood. All the ingredients are separately mounded on the greens for you to mix as you like, but it's the dressing -- so good and garlicky that vampires will not be able to stand within a ten foot radius of you -- that drives me wild. As much as I love several of the entrees at this south suburban restaurant, I find myself ordering this salad for dinner on a regular basis.

Suzy