How to Dress a Salad

Making homemade salad dressing should be a matter of pride, not fear. It is easy to figure out the balance between oil and more piquant seasonings once you’ve experimented with dressing recipes for a while. Practice with the recipes in this book and you’ll soon get the knack.

Once you’ve prepared a dressing, carefully taste the results before and after you dress the salad. You’ll know instinctively whether the greens need more of this or less of that.

When it’s time to dress your salad, remember the three cardinal rules: Don’t dress it too far in advance, don’t drown it, and toss the greens very well. We generally keep our rinsed and dried greens in a wooden salad bowl in the fridge until about 30 minutes before we’re ready to serve. Then we drizzle a little dressing at a time on the greens and toss, toss, toss until every leaf is coated evenly. Serve and enjoy without delay.