Salads Yam

Let first the onion flourish there,

Rose among roots, the maiden-fair

Wine-scented and poetic soul

Of the capacious salad bowl.

Robert Louis Stevenson

You are standing in a sunny lane in Thailand, lined with shady trees and thick, luxuriant vegetation. Walking slowly down in front of you is a Thai woman in flowered pasin and a loose, cool, white blouse. Every so often she stops and pulls at the trees then bends down and plucks plants from the roadside. If it were another country, you might suppose she was gathering the components of a centerpiece for the table to save the cost of buying flowers. But, if you could follow her in your imagination, you would see her enter the kitchen, carefully wash all the leaves and plants and, then, use them to compose a salad for the next meal.