Schwäbischer Salatteller
Ingredients
Green salad and its dressing
- 150 g soft leaf lettuce, leaves torn rounded
- 20 ml white wine vinegar rounded
- 20 ml cold water rounded
- 45 ml sunflower oil rounded
- 5 g medium mustard rounded
- 3 g sugar rounded
- 2 g fine salt rounded
- 1 g black pepper rounded
- 10 g chives, thinly sliced rounded
Gurkensalat
- 350 g cucumber, sliced paper thin rounded
- 5 g fine salt, for drawing out water rounded
- 25 ml white wine vinegar rounded
- 20 ml sunflower oil rounded
- 8 g sugar rounded
- 1 g black pepper rounded
- 8 g dill, finely chopped rounded
Krautsalat with caraway
- 400 g white cabbage, cored and shaved very fine rounded
- 8 g fine salt rounded
- 5 g sugar rounded
- 60 g yellow onion, very finely diced rounded
- 40 ml white wine vinegar rounded
- 40 ml neutral oil rounded
- 3 g caraway seeds, whole rounded
- 1 g black pepper rounded
Karottensalat
- 300 g carrots, peeled and coarsely grated rounded
- 20 ml lemon juice rounded
- 10 ml white wine vinegar rounded
- 25 ml neutral oil rounded
- 5 g sugar rounded
- 3 g fine salt rounded
- 1 g black pepper rounded
Rote-Bete-Salat
- 350 g beets, raw and whole rounded
- 60 g red onion, finely diced rounded
- 30 ml red wine vinegar rounded
- 30 ml rapeseed oil rounded
- 3 g sugar rounded
- 3 g fine salt rounded
- 1 g black pepper rounded
Quick-pickled red onions
- 150 g red onions, sliced into thin rings rounded
- 100 ml apple cider vinegar rounded
- 100 ml water rounded
- 15 g sugar rounded
- 5 g fine salt rounded
- 3 g yellow mustard seeds (optional) rounded
Method
How to build the plate
The Salatteller is a composed plate, not a bowl. Several small prepared salads sit beside each other, cold or at room temperature, next to something warm and rich.
Pick three to five of the component salads below, plus the potato salad. Schwäbischer Kartoffelsalat is the anchor of the plate and it is made separately from its own page. It is not repeated here, because it needs an hour of resting minimum and a day is better, so it wants its own timeline.
Choose for contrast rather than variety for its own sake. Aim for one starchy, one crunchy raw vegetable, one leafy, and one sharp or pickled. Potato salad, Krautsalat, Karottensalat, green leaves, and pickled onions covers all four and is a good default.
Keep the dressings in the same family. Every component below is built on the same oil and vinegar base, sometimes with mustard, sometimes with a little sugar to round the acid. That is what makes the plate read as one dish rather than a buffet. The moment you put a creamy dressing next to a sharp one, the plate falls apart.
Nothing here uses mayonnaise. Nothing here goes out hot.
Method
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Quick-pickled red onions. Pack the onion rings into a clean jar. Bring the cider vinegar, water, sugar, salt, and mustard seeds to a boil, stirring until the sugar and salt dissolve. Pour the hot brine over the onions, pressing them down so they are covered. Cool, then refrigerate. They are usable after an hour and good after a night. They keep for weeks.
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Rote-Bete-Salat. Scrub the beets and simmer them whole and unpeeled in a small amount of water until a knife goes in easily, 30 to 40 minutes depending on size. Cool them enough to handle, then slip the skins off with your thumbs. Halve and slice thin. Whisk the red wine vinegar, oil, sugar, salt, and pepper, stir in the red onion, and turn the beet slices through it. Wear gloves or accept pink hands.
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Krautsalat with caraway. Shave the cabbage as fine as you can manage, ideally on a mandoline. Toss it with the salt and sugar in a large bowl and knead it hard with your hands for a minute or two until it goes limp and releases juice. Let it stand 20 minutes, then drain off the liquid. Add the onion, vinegar, oil, caraway, and pepper. Turn well and leave it to sit. This one needs hours, not minutes.
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Karottensalat. Grate the carrots coarsely. Whisk the lemon juice, vinegar, sugar, salt, and pepper until the sugar and salt dissolve, then whisk in the oil. Turn the carrots through it and leave for 30 minutes. The oil matters here: it softens the raw carrot and carries the flavour, and without it the salad tastes thin.
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Gurkensalat. Slice the cucumber paper thin, salt it, and leave it in a colander for 20 to 30 minutes to drain. Pat it dry. Whisk the vinegar, oil, sugar, and pepper, stir in the dill, and toss it through the cucumber. Dress this one no more than 15 minutes before it goes on the plate.
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Green salad. Pull the lettuce apart into bite-sized pieces rather than cutting it, wash, and spin it properly dry. Wet leaves shed dressing. Whisk the vinegar, water, mustard, sugar, salt, and pepper until dissolved, then whisk in the oil in a slow stream. Dress the leaves at the very last moment and finish with the chives.
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Assemble. Give each component its own small mound on a wide plate or shallow bowl rather than mixing them. Leave a little space between them so the dressings do not run together. Put the potato salad at the centre or to one side as the largest mound, and set the leaves at the edge where they will not sit in liquid.
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Serve. Cold or at room temperature, never hot, next to the warm main. Bring the potato salad out of the fridge half an hour ahead. Fridge-cold potato salad tastes of nothing.
Make-ahead
- Better the next day: Krautsalat, Rote-Bete-Salat, and the pickled onions. All three want at least four hours and are better overnight. The Krautsalat in particular is harsh and squeaky on the first day and mellow on the second.
- Same day, a few hours ahead: Karottensalat is fine dressed 30 minutes to 3 hours out. The potato salad follows its own page and wants an hour minimum.
- Last minute only: leaves, cucumber, and tomato. Dress them within 15 minutes of serving. Leaves collapse, cucumber weeps, and tomato turns the plate into soup.
- You can do the whole plate over two days. Pickles and Krautsalat and beets on day one, potato salad in the evening, carrots and cucumber and leaves on the day.
Notes
- The most common failure is a wet plate. Salt and drain the cucumber, drain the Krautsalat properly after kneading it, and dry the lettuce. Liquid pooling under the mounds ruins everything it touches.
- The second most common failure is too much dressing. These are small portions and they need less than you think. Dress lightly, taste, and add more.
- Vacuum-packed cooked beets are sold everywhere in Germany and are perfectly good here. They cut 40 minutes off the work. Rinse them and slice them straight in.
- Gelbe Rüben is the Swabian word for carrots. Ask for them that way at the market in Schwäbisch Hall and you will be understood better than if you say Karotten.
- No white wine vinegar in the house? Apple cider vinegar works throughout, and a mild herb vinegar is closer to what most households actually use.
- For a softer green salad dressing, stir a tablespoon of yogurt or crème fraîche into it. Do that only if no other component on the plate is sharp, or the two dressings will fight.
- Swap freely. Tomato salad with onion and parsley, sliced radishes salted and dressed sharp, or grated celery root all belong here. Keep the same oil and vinegar base and they will fit.
- Every one of these scales up and stands alone. Double the quantities and any single component becomes a proper side salad for four in its own right.
- Beside rich warm mains is where this belongs: Käse Spätzle, Maultaschen, Sauerbraten, Zwiebelrostbraten, grilled sausages, or schnitzel. The cold, sharp salads cut through the butter and the meat.
Sources used
- Food for the Soul: Omas Gurkensalat mit Essig und Öl
- Malte’s Kitchen: Gurkensalat mit Essig, Öl und Dill
- Cook and Soul: Krautsalat mit Essig, Öl und Kümmel
- kocha.de: Schwäbischer Krautsalat
- Mamas Rezepte: Karottensalat
- Küchengötter: Einfacher Rote-Bete-Salat
- Lecker: Eingelegte rote Zwiebeln
- Thomas Sixt: Kopfsalat mit Essig-Öl-Dressing