Bread salad is a great way to use up leftover, day-old bread. You can use any kind you want. If you are gluten-intolerant, then gluten-free bread is for you. Vegan? Substitute vegan cheese.
Salads
Cobb Salad
The iconic Cobb salad has stood the test of time. Bursting with a harmonious blend of flavors and textures, this salad has been a favorite among food enthusiasts for decades.
Louis Dressing for Wedge Crab Salad
Louis dressing is a classic accompaniment to a classic wedge salad. Light and flavor-packed with juicy crab, crisp iceberg lettuce, and avocado.
Microwave-Boiled Dressing for Coleslaw
Microwave-boiled dressing for coleslaw is a summer favorite. It’s perfect for barbeques and get-togethers.
Summer Bean Salad with Lemon Mayonnaise
Hellman’s Mayonnaise in California
What!!!!! What did you say? Hellman’s Mayonnaise in California? Well, actually, no it was Hellman’s Sandwich Spread in Glendale, California.
Spane and I were at the 99 Cents Only store on our way to visit Alexandria’s Archives’s President, and stopped at the store to get a Danish or something, and I spied these jars of Hellman’s. I was amazed, and then found a jar of Bestfoods next to it. I couldn’t help take a picture, considering that I will probably never see the two brands together in the same place, unless I take it upon myself to start rock climbing or something. Don’t get your hopes up, folks, this was a jar of Hellman’s that will expire in August, 2014, just a few weeks after this post. So, no, we won’t be buying that.
I have to say I was flabbergasted when I found Hellman’s in Glendale. I told Spane that the jar was very, very far from home. Hellman’s is typically not sold west of the Rocky Mountains, where Best Foods is sold. The ingredients on both are the same, while some people prefer Best Foods because it is perceived to have a more tangy flavor, more vinegar. Wikipedia has an interesting article about the history of the popular condiment.
Mayonnaise is a great starter for sauces, including my Summer Bean Salad with Lemon Mayonnaise. It also has a host of other uses, but we will talk about those another day.
German Blue Cheese Red Potato Salad
Recipes in this Post
Independence Day
When Spane and I went to the store and I picked out our 4th of July dinner, I got to thinking that I really missed German Potato Salad. When my family was stationed in Kaiserslautern in Germany, it was something that we had quite often. I’ve had it since coming back to the United States, but it never seemed as good. I thought maybe I could improve on it.
But, why would I want to have German Potato Salad on a holiday that celebrates Independence from British rule? Well, because there were plenty of Germans involved in the Revolutionary War, among them Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben. There were also French involved in helping us win, hence the inclusion of Blue Cheese
Watermelon Basil Salad – a Savory Delight
Watermelon Basil Salad
Watermelon Basil salad is great on a hot day, for a barbecue, or when you want something simple and flavorful. The flavor combination will surprise you.
Cranberry Cream Cheese Salad Ring
I don’t know why people insist on buying the cranberry sauce in the can. Making cranberry sauce from scratch is almost as easy as opening the can. In some cases, when your can opener refuses to play well with the can, it’s even easier! Sugar, cranberries and water, how simple is that? In addition, you get the fun of listening to the berries as they pop like popcorn. How cool is that?
Ah, but I can’t leave well enough alone. I have to make something special for Thanksgiving, so I’m going to doll my cranberry sauce up, put it into a ring mold, and have a lovely presentation.
When I was a little girl, going to my Uncle Bob’s house for Thanksgiving, he made the most wonderful cranberry ring with cream cheese. I loved it but never got the recipe. When I asked him about it, he said he hadn’t made it in so many years he had forgotten how to make it and never wrote it down. I’ve looked all over the Internet, but, alas no joy. So, today, I’m going to attempt to make a similar side dish. Wish me luck!
Thousand Island Dressing with Balsamic Toasts
Recipes in this Post
Why would anyone want to write about Thousand Island Dressing? It’s yucky! It’s that reddish stuff that sits on the salad bar and congeals because no one wants it, and rightly so. It’s the “secret” sauce on the Big Mac and has become so common that you probably don’t even notice it on your sandwich anymore. That’s a pity because this is a grand dame of salad dressings with an interesting and honorable history.
Thousand Island Dressing is named for the archipelago of 1,864 islands that straddles the Canada-U.S. border in the Saint Lawrence River. Some of the islands are very small indeed. The one pictured above supports a single tree and two bushes. The dressing was popularized by May Irwin, a Canadian vaudeville star in the 1890s. She had a home in Grindstone Island, one of the Thousand Islands. She said that the dressing reminded her of the Thousand Islands, and enjoyed the dressing so much that she requested the recipe from Sophia LaLonde, a fishing guide’s wife who frequently made the dressing for her husband. Miss Irwin then gave the recipe to George Boldt, the proprietor of the famous Waldorf-Astoria Hotel, who instructed his the hotel’s maître d’hôtel, Oscar Tschirky, to put the dressing on the menu. In 1950 the dressing became a standard and started its decline into the gloppy mess we have today.
One of the things we do at The Good Plate is to reconstruct packaged foods, so they taste better, and don’t have the preservatives common in packaged foods. I knew that venerable Thousand Island Dressing deserved a better place, and making it from scratch would make it one of my favorites, especially for seafood salads.
I made a crab salad for the dressing, and some Balsamic Toasts to go with them. This was amid Spane and his friend making Play Dough on the stove. There are little bits of homemade Play Dough all over the place. Time to clean!
Original Brown Derby Salad Dressing for Antipasto
Sometimes it’s a terrible thing to get old enough to remember wonderful restaurants that have closed down, notably The Brown Derby in Hollywood and Little Joe’s in Downtown Los Angeles. I’ll show you how to recreate some of the iconic recipes from these wonderful places.