Ruby Tandoh, the food writer and author of All Consuming, has declared that she is not naturally a salad person but is attempting a rebrand this summer. In a personal essay, she describes how the season often triggers self-criticism about things like haircuts or unwearable summer shoes, but this year she is trying to embrace salads not for an idealized version of herself, but for who she truly is.
A Family History of Non-Salad People
Tandoh admits her cooking instincts lean toward stews, braises, and soups—dishes that cook and meld. She notes that her family never fully embraced salads. Sometimes they would serve a bowl of undressed iceberg lettuce, and when they did attempt a real salad, the results were unconventional. She recalls a Nigel Slater recipe that included beansprouts, red pepper slices, and ripe banana in a sesame oil dressing, which she likens to a creation by Dr. Seuss. Her father would make Ghanaian salad with lettuce, tomato, cucumber, hard-boiled egg, tinned sardines, and, controversially, baked beans.
First Great Salad at University
Tandoh’s first truly memorable salad came from her Swiss friend Tessa, who made an Ottolenghi-inspired dish with baby spinach, toasted pitta pieces, chopped medjool dates, and sumac. Tandoh says she thinks of this salad often and recently recreated it with success, wondering why she doesn’t make it more.
Rejecting Instagram Salad Culture
In her quest to become a salad person, Tandoh initially turned to Instagram but was put off by influencers who describe vegetables as “veggies” and mention pimples, lymphatic drainage, or gut health in recipe videos. She finds this normalized intrusion of health and beauty concerns into food unsettling. Instead, she returned to cookbooks for inspiration, valuing words that paint salads as compositions of artfully chosen nouns.
The Power of Words in Salad Making
Tandoh cites John Evelyn’s centuries-old recipe listing parsley, sage, garlic, chives, onions, leek, borage, mint, scallion, fennel, nasturtium, rue, rosemary, and purslane as an example of a salad that reads beautifully. She also references food writer John Birdsall’s description of “drifts of leaves and flowers, sprigs of herbs and tiny carrots that looked like they had been blown there by some mighty force of nature.” She appreciates salads that test the definition of the dish, finding pure green salads too austere for her taste.
Finding Her Own Salad Style
Inspired by Laurie Colwin’s observation that chicken salad has the glamour of a little black dress, Tandoh made a Nigel Slater recipe with watercress, leftover roast chicken, orange, and soy-toasted pumpkin seeds and almonds. She enjoyed it but wondered about adding toasted pitta chips. She concludes that one cannot suddenly become a “troughful of veggies” person any more than one can pivot to Y2K low-rise jeans. She is learning to salad for the person she is, not the person she wants to be, and finds it suits her well.
