Winter salads

On another thread about tomatoes in the winter, I said that we basically boycott them until we can get decent ones around the time the school year is over here. A "tossed salad" without tomatoes seems kind of naked so we usually switch gears to winter salad mode.

Caesar and spinach salads are OK because we can get nice romaine and spinach at the grocery store but since we often pack salads for lunch, we tend to go with mixed vegetable salads in the winter. This weekend, I made a big batch of caponata since beautiful eggplants were $1.00 at the farmers' market (but with canned diced tomatoes instead of fresh).

We'll have pepper cabbage (a mayonnaiseless coleslaw), grilled eggplant and portobello mushroom salad, Morrocan carrot salad, curried cabbage and rice salad, roasted beet salad with toasted walnuts and blue cheese and other non-tomato and cucumber salads.

If you live in a part of the country with cold winters, do you switch gears for winter salads? If so, what are some of your favorites? Or do you search the stores for that perfect out-of-season tomato?

I've never much liked tomatoes in salads so it's not a problem for me but when I put them in I often use cherry tomatoes and those don't seem to lose their flavor in winter like the regular ones. Mostly though I eat Caesar salads and variations on that theme. I'm not sure if it counts, but when I can get reasonably priced asparagus, I love it cooked but chilled with salad dressing on it. My Safeway had it for $1.29/lb this week.

Thats one of my favorite salads,a Honeymoon Salad--Lettuce alone. Chow Jim

Hello All,
I make myself a salad each day as part of my main meal, which is salad and french fries, (yes, that is my meal of joy.)
I have to have tomato in my salad, but thanks to the local Costco, I have no problem.
They have grape tomatoes which are good, but they also have Campari Tomatoes, which are
smaller than regular tomatoes, but much, much, bigger than grape tomatoes. And the flavour
is very good. I also makes sandwiches with them. They remind me of early 4th of July tomatoes.
I eat the Campari tomatoes until my home grown ones are ripe.
Take Care,
Fieldthistle

With all the "bagged" salads available this is almost a no-brainer, throw in some sliced red onion and halfed grape tomatos, or olives and grated cheese, shredded roast beef or chopped chicken. Salad is a leftover magnet.

quote:

Originally posted by dreamzpainter

With all the "bagged" salads available this is almost a no-brainer, throw in some sliced red onion and halfed grape tomatos, or olives and grated cheese, shredded roast beef or chopped chicken. Salad is a leftover magnet.

I have also been getting grape tomato's, as they are the only tomato right now that has some flavor.
Corn is a good ingredient also.

Fieldthistle, I absolutely agree with you on the Campari tomatoes. I take 'em out of the box, wash 'em in the sink, and just pig out. Also, if you combine with those tomatoes some nice chilled asparagus which has been cooked just until crisp, a little crisp bacon, some baby greens and a dip/dressing I found on the Internet that has a roasted red pepper,a cup of mayo, garlic, cayenne and a bit of sugar (I use Splenda as well as the light mayo). This is a great winter salad. Let me know how you like it. You could leave the bacon out but it truly adds depth to this salad.

My local co-op deli has little cipolla onions marinated in balsamic vinegar that are a great sweet-sour treat. I cut up a couple of those and pair them with red leaf lettuce and crumbled blue cheese with a vinaigrette dressing. The combination of flavors is great!