Today on Food on Fridays we consider the notion of the side salad.

Well, actually, we consider what constitutes a standard side salad.   Not every culture approaches the idea of a salad the same way, a fact I’ve only recently stopped and thought about it.

This idea was put forth when Chris was chatting with one of his Chinese colleagues a couple of weeks ago.  Chris’ colleague had lived in both Germany and France for several years, and he eats and enjoys many types of European food.  However, the one thing he said he can’t quite get used to is the salad.

Which surprised me – a salad is hard to get used to?  But then again, here in Germany, it has taken me a while to adjust my expectations about what will come in a salad in a restaurant.  Minimally a side salad here is always served with the following:

• some green lettuce, typically iceberg.
• perhaps a few red lettuce leaves
• thin strips of cabbage
• beets
• tomato wedges
• slices of cucumber
• potato salad (hidden underneath the lettuce)
• a creamy dressing liberally lathered over the whole thing

Often, but not always, it might also come with:

• cold corn kernels
• tiny squares of red bell pepper
• pickled cucumber salad

Now, that’s rather different from what you’d typically get in the U.S., where a side salad would typically just be greens, tomatoes and maybe a piece of cucumber or two, plus some croutons.  I’m not actually a big crouton fan, so it’s not like I miss them, but there are never croutons in Germany.

Also in the U.S. the salad dressing has a central role: you get your choice of dressings, and depending on how fancy the restaurant is, the dressings may also be equally fancy. Here in Germany, your salad comes with the creamy white dressing. I don’t know what it is exactly, but it’s always the same, no matter the restaurant.

Italians also have an invariant approach to salad dressing.  Your salad bowl comes filled with various kinds of greens, tomatoes, and maybe some cucumber.  You’re given a tray with a bottle of oil and a bottle of vinegar (typically balsamic), salt and pepper; i.e. you have the makings for what in the U.S. is called “Italian” salad dressing.  You then decide what and how much to add to the bowl yourself.

The different approaches to salad aren’t limited to two places.  If you’ve ever eaten in a Japanese restaurant, and gotten salad there, you’ll know it’s typically just in a little bowl with a few lettuce leaves, and comes topped with a miso-based dressing.

Now,  I don’t think that it’s as difficult for people to adjust to culturally divergent salads as it was for breakfast foods. But even so, it seems that salad might need to be considered another item where cultural habits are hard to break.  Food for thought at least.

“Lettuce” ponder.