Vegetable salads on the menu
California Pizza Kitchen
Various locations
Thai Crunch Salad: shredded napa
cabbage, chilled/grilled chicken
breast, julienne cucumbers, edamame,
crispy wontons, rice sticks, peanuts,
cilantro, julienne carrots, red cabbage
and green onions, tossed with lime/
cilantro/peanut dressing
Nevertheless, vegetable salads are worth
putting on the menu. “They absolutely have
a role in a multicourse menu, and add a
nutritional component that some customers
seek,” says Percy Whatley, CEC, executive
chef at the Ahwahnee Dining Room
in The Ahwahnee Hotel at California’s
Yosemite National Park and corporate
chef for the western region of Buffalo,
N. Y.-based Delaware North Companies
(DNC). He oversees all culinary operations
in Yosemite and at Wuksachi Lodge in
Sequoia National Park, Visalia, Calif.,
and The Queen Mary, Long Beach, Calif.,
where DNC is the concessionaire.
or dinner.” In addition, they allow Marcus to
always have a vegetarian dish on the menu.
Chop’t
New York; Washington, D.C.
Vegetarian Powerhouse: broccoli,
edamame, carrots, sunflower seeds,
craisins and apples chopped with
spinach/romaine lettuce ($8.75)
She follows the seasons when it comes
to vegetable salads, and uses a variety of
root vegetables in the winter. Her summer
platters might include roasted asparagus,
artichokes and cauliflower. On a buffet,
she usually offers more than one salad.
Falai Panetteria
New York
Baby arugula, beets, fennel, roasted
almonds, goat cheese, with roasted
shallot vinaigrette ($7)
Full O’ Life Restaurant
Burbank, Calif.
Raw Vegetable Salad: shredded
beets, carrots, zucchini, alfalfa
sprouts, coleslaw, tomatoes and
cucumbers, choice of dressing
($8.95); Sunshine Salad: romaine
lettuce, spinach, watercress, green
onion, parsley, red cabbage, Italian
squash, avocado, tomato, mushrooms
and cucumber, topped with sesame
seeds ($8.95)
While sales of salads as sides may be down,
the trend toward boutique salad shops, such
as Chicago-based Freshii, with locations
nationwide, and Chop’t, with locations in New
York and Washington, D.C., continues. Both
offer salad toppings ranging from broccoli
and carrots to bean sprouts and edamame.
And at the Greenleaf Gourmet Chopshop in
Beverly Hills and Century City, Calif., the build-your-own salad includes traditional toppings
and some out-of-the-ordinary choices, such
as artichokes, broccolini, grilled corn, herb-roasted potatoes and jicama.
Among her innovative salad selections are a
fried-okra salad with greens, bacon crumbles
and classic French dressing. For a nice tart
salad, she combines steamed green beans
with feta cheese, diced red onion, diced
walnuts and a parsley vinaigrette. A fun
presentation is her bok choy salad. She grills
the bok choy, cuts it through the center and
combines it with wild mushrooms, rice wine
vinegar, garlic and oyster sauce. “It’s like
eating a small head of bok choy,” she says.
Her Fourth of July potato salad is made with
baby red, white and blue potatoes, red onion,
chives and dill. To prepare her asparagus
platter, she fans cooked asparagus around
fresh mushrooms, marinated artichokes, black
and green olives and grape tomatoes, and
adds a splash of Vidalia onion vinaigrette.
Vanity Fare Catering
Salt Lake City
Roasted Marinated Baby Vegetables:
baby zucchini, baby sunburst squash,
baby Bermuda onions, assorted
baby peppers, in an herb/balsamic
vinaigrette
Wolfgang Puck Bar & Grill
Las Vegas
Marinated baby beets, orange
segments, Humboldt Fog cheese,
pistachios, olive oil
ON THE CATERING MENU
Salad shop owners aren’t the only
foodservice operators to add assorted
vegetables to their salad offerings. Annette
Marcus, owner of Annette Marcus Catering,
Atlanta, has a list of 21 of the salads she
makes with vegetables on her website
( www.annettemarcuscatering.com). “You
can add just about anything to a salad,” she
says. “Salads are colorful, flavorful and a
great side dish or entrée for brunch, lunch
The key to successful salad serving, Marcus
advises, is to “make sure everything is fresh.
We clean and cut our ingredients in advance,
but put the salads together at serving time.”
IT’S ALL IN THE INGREDIENTS
“Spring is the best time to do what I do,”
says Josh Thomsen, executive chef at The
Claremont Hotel Club & Spa in Berkeley,
Calif. He admits, though, that his location in
the heart of the Northern California salad
www.acfchefs.org
