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Alex Harrell, chef and owner of Angeline in New Orleans, presents his fried chicken livers in a lighter format by putting them in a salad. To make the dish, he soaks the livers in buttermilk spiked with housemade hot sauce and Worcestershire sauce. Then he coats them in a mixture of three parts flour to two parts corn flour to one part cornstarch, and deep-fries them.
“The breading itself, because of the different textures, really seals around the livers and develops this incredibly crispy breading,” Harrell said.
He quickly pickles blueberries by simmering two parts distilled vinegar with one part water, one part sugar and a couple of bay leaves, pouring that over the blueberries and refrigerating them overnight. He plates the berries and livers with arugula dressed with a blend of buttermilk, apple cider vinegar aïoli, cracked black pepper and smoked paprika.
David Groll, the new corporate chef at Beef ‘O’ Brady’s, has added three salads to the casual-dining chain’s menu, including this Summer Salad composed of a spring mix with dried cranberries, apple slices, Parmesan cheese, diced tomatoes and almonds tossed in raspberry vinaigrette.
He also has introduced a Mediterranean salad, which is essentially a Greek salad on a romaine base in an olive-oil-based dressing with feta in it, and a Chicken Chicken salad, which is classic chicken salad on a bed of spring mix with honey roasted almonds, dried cranberries, tomatoes and raspberry vinaigrette.
The salads have boosted sales mix a full percentage point, from 4 percent to 5 percent, Groll said.
Susan Dederen, vice president of culinary at La Madeleine, has upgraded the chain’s salads, including this Bacon & Berry Salade. It is made with strawberries, blueberries, roasted almonds, spring lettuce mix and pieces of bacon, tossed in a balsamic vinaigrette. The salad is served with a sweet, lemony madeleine, which the restaurant also sells in its bakery.
At Meauxbar in New Orleans, chef Kristen Essig makes a vegan lentil and farro salad with eggplant, cashew “ricotta” and preserved lemon.
The “ricotta” is raw chopped cashews that Essig soaks in water overnight and purees with lemon juice and salt.
“It doesn’t taste at all like ricotta,” she said. “It’s delicious, but the name is more about the appearance.”
The salad also has boiled green lentils and farro; a fine, cooked mirepoix; roasted local eggplant; purslane; and sultana raisins rehydrated with equal parts white wine vinegar, white wine and water. The salad is dressed with a vinaigrette of preserved lemon and topped with chickpeas that have been fried and dusted with toasted ground cumin, sumac, lemon zest, salt and pepper. It is served at room temperature, except for the eggplant, which is cold.
At Napolese, a three-unit pizza chain in Indianapolis, chef Tyler Herald roasts carrots of various colors, chops them roughly and plates them with roasted green beans, roasted corn, basil, shaved Parmesan cheese and peaches that are sliced to order. He tosses the salad in olive oil and finishes it with a balsamic reduction.
Emily Hahn, chef of Warehouse in Charleston, S.C., uses smoked mussels as the centerpiece of one of her salads. She smokes mussels at 180 degrees Fahrenheit for about 90 minutes, and then steams them open over water with lemon, shallots and garlic.
She chills the mussels, shucks them and dresses them in what she calls a “very tart” vinaigrette with garlic, lemon, local honey, hot sauce, a little caper juice and Dijon mustard, emulsified with a blended oil.
The salad also has shaved raw fennel, shaved pickled fennel, cucumbers, capers, shaved radishes and English peas.
