Salad, glorious salad
Not just a plate of leafy greens anymore, but a dish in its own right, salads are no longer reserved for diets alone, and are now served as a either a side or an entrée. There are so many to choose from and if a pre-prepared one is not what you’re looking for, there are now ‘salad bars’ so you can create your own.
According to sources, the salad has been around since the Roman Empire. Named after the Latin for salt (sal), these were usually leafy green dishes covered in a salty, oily dressing (hence the name). This ‘garden’ variety of salad still lives on, but it has evolved since the mid 20th century and now offers so much more than its sparse predecessor.
From vegetables to pasta to seafood to eggs, salads contain a multitude of ingredients and we enjoy experimenting. Although we do love preparing a good Caesar salad and adding to a traditional Greek salad, combining unusual ingredients together to create taste sensations is something we do every day here at Parties to Go. We offer a variety of salads as sides to accompany our mains, as well as including them in our BBQ, bowl food and buffet menus. The colour and variety really bring the food to life and not only taste but look great too.
So, if you’re considering catering and wondering what to serve with your main, don’t be afraid to consider salad. Especially after the summer we have had, they can be an interesting accompaniment to many dishes, even those you wouldn’t usually consider a salad for!
And if that wasn’t enough to whet your appetite, here are a few juicy and interesting facts about the humble salad:
- Lettuce is actually a member of the sunflower family.
- Lettuce was first eaten by the ancient kings of Persia over 2,500 years ago.
- The oldest English language cookbook, The Forme of Cury (written in the 1300’s), contains the first known recipe for salad, a little number that included lettuce, leeks and spinach served with garlic, herbs and (hopefully) edible flowers.
- Many salads, with a prepared dressing, contain more calories than a double cheeseburger or pizza, killing the ‘diet’ perception of a salad (a McDonald’s crispy chicken and bacon salad has more kcal and fat than a McDonald’s cheeseburger).
- The word “avocado” comes from ahuacatl, which means “testicle” in Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs. This is more than likely due to their shape and the fact they grow in pairs.
- In the 1930’s U.S. spinach growers credited Popeye with a 33% increase in domestic spinach consumption.
- The Caesar salad was first created in Tijuana, Mexico in the 1920s by Alex Cardini, who made this salad at his brother Caesar’s restaurant. It is mentioned in many books including Julia Child’s famous cookbook From Julia Child’s Kitchen.
- The largest salad weighed 20,100 kg (44,312 lb 14 oz) and was achieved by Mouzenidis Travel (Russia), on Red Square in Moscow, Russia, on 4 September 2016. This Greek salad consisted of tomatoes, cucumbers, onions, olives, feta cheese, olive oil, oregano and salt.
- There are at least 10,000 varieties of tomatoes, from small cherry ones to Ponderosa, which can weigh over a 1.3kg (3lb).
- The expression ‘salad days’ first appeared in Shakespeare’s Antony And Cleopatra.
