don't taste pleasant raw. You may prefer to blanch others, like carrots to intensify flavor and

color. Still others, like walnuts, are best lightly toasted to bring out flavors. Do any cooking or

blanching after you cut the food up. You can do all this preparation hours ahead and then store

the ingredients on a tray in the refrigerator.

When you're ready to assemble the composed salad, spread out the individual plates on a

table or counter and start constructing. The job takes some concentration, and it is best done

without interruption. If guests are hovering around your kitchen and you can't get rid of them,

find an empty room. Even the basement will do if there is a table.

Tear the selected greens into bite-sized pieces or use whole leaves and let the guests do

the struggling. Distribute them on the plates as beds of greens. With a preplanned picture in

mind, arrange the rest of the ingredients on the beds. You can arrange them randomly or group

same ingredients in clusters with contrasting shapes and colors next to each other. Use the color

of the greens to contrast with the assembled items, for instance, the orange color of a carrot

cluster is set off nicely against the deep green of spinach.

Arrange all plates according to the same pattern scheme. You can, if you prefer, build a

single prototype, then arrange the rest of the salads like the mock-up. Once you have a prototype,

others can help you to build the salad. For additional interest, add one ingredient that is unique

on each plate and see how many guests will notice. (With deep conversation probably none will.)

Making a composed salad sounds more complicated than it really is. Try it once and

you'll see for yourself. It is particularly easy when you’re entertaining 20 or 30 guests. Once you

lay out the plates and chop and prepare the ingredients, you can assemble the salads in 10

minutes. Drizzling on the dressing takes another 3 or 4 minutes.

When preparing salad for this many, a quick and easy way to dispense the dressing is a

drip bottle, like a plastic mustard dispenser with a small hole in the tip. Put the dressing in the

dispenser well ahead of serving time. Shake it up thoroughly just before serving (to make an

emulsion) and drizzle the dressing on each salad. It is very quick. Make sure you don't drown the

salad in dressing. It is far better to have your salad underdressed than overdressed.

The dressing for a composed salad can be anything you wish. Vinaigrettes are best

because they are transparent and don't hide your gorgeous creation.

Storing your greens

All salad greens, even when torn to pieces, are living plants. They need water and they

need air. They don't do well at all in a closed plastic bag—they use up the available air, humidity

in the bag builds too high, and rot and mold set in. If you don't use your greens within a day or

two, here is a good way to keep them fresh and crisp even up to a week. First wash the greens

thoroughly in cold water (contrary to what many cookbooks tell you) when you get home from

the market. The greens soak up water they need, their cells swell with moisture and the leaves

become crisp. Now remove as much of the surface water as possible, extra water that causes

rotting and browning. Shake them thoroughly, use a salad spinner or soak the extra moisture up

with a kitchen towel. Whatever way, try to dry them as well as you can. Next, wrap the greens in

a dry kitchen towel, roll them up fairly tightly in the towel, squeeze much of the air out and place

this package in a plastic bag. You will be surprised how well they keep this way in the

refrigerator.

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