SALADS

It is assumed that you, dear reader, have sense enough to salt and pepper the following as needed – or to add a garnish of parsley, etc. when appropriate. Always wash greens.

• 1 cup of tomato juice or V8
• 2 cups of chicken or beef stock or aspic
• 2 tablespoons of gelatine mixed with 2 tablespoons of water
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce and 1/4 teaspoon Tabasco (or to taste)
• 1/4 onion, chopped; tarragon, thyme and bay to taste

Add the spices and onion to the stock and bring to a boil, remove from the fire and let it steep for 15 minutes or so. Add the moistened gelatine. Mix it back in the stock, along with the tomato juice, and reheat it - stirring well. Strain through a hair sieve or a cheese cloth into a container or mold. Taste for seasoning, remembering that it will have less flavor when chilled. Refrigerate the mix for two hours or more, so that is thoroughly jelled and cold.

Cut into chunky pieces and serve on a green salad. Garnish with hard boiled egg quarters, capers and a green mayonnaise.

It can also be made into a jellied loaf containing cut - up cooked or raw vegetables with chicken or shrimp. Get creative. See aspic in the Chicken section.

This is our standard dinner salad when company's coming. Break off several leaves of Boston or other tender lettuce, take out the center ribs, roll the leaves together and cut across in ½ inch pieces to make strips. Dress at the last minute with vinaigrette containing a beaten coddled egg, or leave out the egg and top the salad with a Mimosa garnish – hard boiled egg yolk pushed through a strainer. Place it on the center, then sieve the white around it. Dress with vinaigrette. Chiffon means rags in French.

This can be found in every food court, and it is still a favorite when tomatoes are in season. Peel a cucumber and cut in half lengthwise, scoop out the seeds and slice it across. Peel and thinly slice a purple onion. Clean 2 or 3 tomatoes and cut them into eighths (or quarters if they are small). Toss it all with vinaigrette and let it rest in the fridge, covered, to meld the flavors. Best when it is about a day old.

Cut the avocado into ½” slices. Peel the grapefruit and section it. This is done by cutting to the center along one of the dividing membranes then turning the knife to scoop out the section. Work over a bowl to save the juice, and squeeze the debris.

Alternate the grapefruit sections and the avocado slices on salad plates and dress them with olive oil, the juices from the grapefruit and a very little vinegar. One of those wonderful combinations. CC introduced this one.

Another old fashioned salad that is rarely seen now is Iceberg lettuce with Russian dressing. We had this about twice a year. The old recipe has an eighth wedge of a head of lettuce plopped on a plate and dressed with mayonnaise mixed with a little ketchup and chopped sweet pickle and minced hard-boiled egg. An easy one is mayo mixed with a mild salsa from the jar - also with egg and pickle. Great for lazy cooks and old guys trying to relive their childhood.

Beet or broccoli was probably the most common vegetable salad. The beet salad was one that CC learned from a Greek restaurateur: Best with freshly roasted beets, but canned will do. Add pitted Kalamata olives, minced garlic, olive oil, and lemon juice to the sliced beets. Let it marinate for at least an hour. It is really an hors d’oeuvre salad. Salt and pepper to taste. Serve with quartered lemons.

The first time we ever saw broccoli was at the old Delmonico’s on St. Charles in the late 1940’s. It was almost unknown in those days, at least in New Orleans. They topped the small dinner salad with a piece of cooked broccoli and an olive.

Try adding some small cubes of raw apple to potato salad.

CC found this recipe somewhere and it was a success from the start. Served with a delicious ripe tomato in season it is sensational.

Peel and seed 2 large or 3 smaller cucumbers and grate by hand or puree in a processor (make it a little coarse, not watery) add 1 tablespoon of white vinegar; 1 teaspoon of salt; white pepper; 1/2 envelope of gelatine – softened in 2 tablespoons of cold water and dissolved in about 2 tablespoons of hot water; 1/2 cup of sour cream and a pinch of sugar.

Mix all ingredients together and put into a freezer tray and freeze until firm. Take out and beat or quickly whip in the Robot. Refreeze. It should have a sherbet texture.

If you are fortunate enough to own a modern electric ice cream machine just chill the mix in the fridge, pour it in and turn it on. Ripen it in the freezer and use soon after making it.

Serve in a hollowed tomato. Chop the tomato flesh scooped from it along with some basil or parsley to garnish the top. Get the tomatoes very cold before putting the cucumber ice in them. Serve on a chiffonade of lettuce.

This is a good hors d'oeuvre, salad or side dish. Pass a bowl of green mayonnaise.

Another simple but impressive salad is made with whole baby Bibb lettuces, washed and drained, placed in a large bowl and tossed with dressing just before serving. Serve one to a customer.

One can, of course, get creative and add other goodies - like sliced artichoke bottoms or grape tomatoes, etc. Just keep it fresh and simple.

Any of the above salads will benefit from the addition of fresh herbs. Parsley, Basil, Dill and Tarragon are favorites, but used judiciously, Mint, Oregano and other strongly flavored herbs can be a pleasant surprise.

Be certain to thoroughly wash all raw veggies, particularly leafies. Dilute vinegar (1 Tbs. : 1 qt. water) is a very good wash to remove bacteria & friends. This is important if you are using “organic” produce because it is usually grown in manure or compost, both of which teem with things like e-coli.

The basic one is, of course, vinaigrette. Just commit the formula to memory- 3 to 1, 3:1, 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar. (you may vary this when you become a virtuoso cook)

The vinegar quality is very important, and the best is the Italian or French wine vinegar. We also liked a good cider vinegar. Keep a bottle of cheap vinegar to use for acidulating water, etc. instead of wasting the expensive one. Balsamic vinegar is almost always a fraud - with sugar and caramel color added. The real thing takes 30 years to make, and is incredibly expensive and hard to get.

For some salads, such as artichoke or avocado, lemon juice is the acid of choice.

When making a vinaigrette, put the vinegar first into a mixing bowl and add the salt and pepper and other seasonings before adding the oil. Salt does not dissolve in oil. If you want the dressing to emulsify and not separate, try adding about ½ teaspoon of mayonnaise or Dijon mustard. These will hold the suspension for about ½ hour. Good for buffets and picnics. Just be sure to not use the yellow “hot dog” mustard, too strong and sour.

CC often made mayonnaise, experimenting with different oils. She had a Wesson mayonnaise maker – a deep glass jar with markings for ingredient amounts, and a plunger that one worked up and down - pouring the oil slowly through a space in the lid. It worked very well, but she found that the blender did the job with much less effort.

We learned to fake it. Adding a little lemon juice to Hellman’s or Blue Plate makes a quite good mayo. The processor is really good for making a green mayonnaise, where fresh herbs such as parsley, tarragon, basil, etc., are added and finely minced. Great on jellied things. (I sneak a very small amount of pureed garlic in this one to sharpen the flavors.) Since there are so many recipes for mayonnaise I’ll not bother with one here. Homemade is better than boughtmade.

This word is pronounced mayonnaise (my-on-ez), not main-ayze.

• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon dry mustard
• 1 teaspoon paprika
• 1 teaspoon ground celery seed
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup vinegar
• 1 cup salad oil
• 1 tablespoon minced onion

Combine all ingredients. Beat in blender until it combines and thickens a little. Chill.

This is contributed by Jim Cambias, from a recipe by Daddy's favorite celebrity chef Jacques Pepin. It's quite simple and very good.

• 1/4 cup heavy cream
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 & 1/2 teaspoon vinegar

Combine cream, salt, and pepper, then beat until the cream thickens, not quite to the point of becoming whipped cream. Mix in the vinegar, and there you are. One could easily add chopped dill or chopped fresh basil.

Maw-maw would pick out very small okra – about 2 inches long, and boil them in salted water until soft. Okra is tough as a boot when raw, and needs to be boiled to the soft and slimy stage, but not stringy. This requires about 15 minutes or more, with frequent stirring. Taste. When they are soft (including the caps) drain and let it cool. Dress with vinaigrette and refrigerate.

This comes from a cookbook called Enoteca, by Joyce Goldstein, and I suspect my father picked it up intending to have a good laugh. However, it's a surprisingly good and useful book, and he wound up getting some extra copies to send out as gifts. The Tuna-Rice salad has become a summertime favorite at my house, so when I cook rice I often make extra to use in making this dish a few days later.

• 1 cup of dry rice, cooked à la Creole (or just in a rice cooker)

• Dressing of 3/4 cup olive oil mixed with the juice of a lemon, with salt and pepper

• 1/2 cup chopped red onion
• 1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley
• 10 ounces of canned tuna (or seared tuna if you have some left over)
• 1 can of flat anchovy fillets
• Tomato wedges (optional)

Cook the rice then let cool. Mix about half the dressing with the rice, along with the onion and parsley, then turn out into your serving bowl. Make a little well in the center and fill with the tuna and anchovies, then pour the remaining dressing over the fish. Decorate the edge with the tomato wedges and serve. This is enough for four to six people as a main dish. Have some bread handy to sop up the delicious fishy oil.