My significant other ate cucumbers and onion with some ranch. I called it a cucumber onion salad. She says there aren’t enough ingredients to call it a salad, because “it takes multiple ingredients”. I pointed out she had three and asked what the minimum is. She refuses to answer so I ask Lemmy.

      • TurtlePower@lemm.ee
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        1 year ago

        Ha! You beat me to it. My dad loved that joke.

        “Do you have honeymoon salad?”

        “What’s honeymoon salad?”

        “Lettuce alone, without dressing.”

        • 200ok@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          More like, “been married for 30 years salad”, amirite?? /BoomerHumor

          • tsonfeir@lemm.ee
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            1 year ago

            I mean, the lettuce might be wilted but as long as you wash it I guess it’s fine. Not like they’ve been feasting, so they’re probably famished.

  • Badass_panda@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    So teeeeechnically, a salad is a dish composed of mixed ingredients. You could make the argument that you mix any two set of chopped ingredients and bingo bongo, it’s a salad.

    However, I like to think that dishes’ ingredients aren’t a taxonomic thing, they’re a probabilistic thing. In other words, there’s no such thing as “not salad” or “salad”, only shades of saladness.

    • Serve it cold? Ok it’s saladier

    • It’s made up of chopped ingredients? Saladier still

    • Those ingredients are mostly vegetables? Getting pretty saladish

    • They’re mixed together? Even more salad like

    • They’ve got some sort of dressing mixed in? Now it’s very likely a salad!

    … and so on. To me, your SO’a dish has a pretty high Salad Probability^tm

        • NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world
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          1 year ago

          Here’s some example weights for a salad factor

          Lettuce - 10

          Spinach - 9

          Arugula - 7

          Cabbage - 7

          Tomato- 6

          Carrots- 6

          Cucumber - 5

          Onion - 4

          Olives (black) 4

          Anchovies - 1

          • Hydroel@lemmy.world
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            1 year ago

            There are a few missing points in there IMO, like which of your ingredient is cooked, or how are they sliced? Graped carrots rises the score, but cook them and it’s less likely to be a salad. Diced radish? Not in my salad, especially not cooked, but thinly sliced raw radish definitely belongs. And don’t even get me started on tomatoes.

            • NotMyOldRedditName@lemmy.world
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              1 year ago

              Damn, I’m not sure the two are compatible then. The salad factor score is meant to be super easy so people don’t get overwhelmed by all the possibilities and variations.

    • blackbrook@mander.xyz
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      1 year ago

      I think this is one of those words / concepts where one needs to invoke Wittgenstein’s “family resemblance” idea. You’re not going to find some exact set of criteria that define what people do and don’t consider a salad. They instead have a “family resemblance”.

      Your probably idea is not a bad way of describing how that works.

      • Badass_panda@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I know, I was being humorous but it is in fact the way most categorization works. Very seldom is it a taxonomy; the way we recognize faces, voices, shapes, etc … it’s all probabilistic.

  • Fizz@lemmy.nz
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    1 year ago

    I think 1 ingredient can be a salad as long as it’s a very salady ingredient.

  • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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    1 year ago

    I would probably still call dressing on just lettuce a salad, although I would say it’s an unusually basic one. 3 ingredients definitely counts.

      • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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        1 year ago

        By some definitions of ingredient, I see what you’re saying, although it might be a simple vinaigrette with two individually obtainable ingredients. However, OP implied they consider dressing one ingredient in the OP, so I went by identity previous to tossing as opposed to identity at any stage of the process.

        • Micromot@lemmycook.de
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          1 year ago

          Do you make your vinaigrette without salt and pepper and maybe those don’t count? The ingredient science is very complex

          • CanadaPlus@lemmy.sdf.org
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            1 year ago

            Do you make your vinaigrette without salt and pepper

            I do, actually. For whatever reason I don’t like most dressings but I enjoy just olive oil and a nice balsamic.

  • MTK@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Been there and found out that If you dig deep enough almost everything is either a salad or a soup

  • vitriolix@lemmy.ml
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    1 year ago

    All you need is lettuce and salt. “Salad” is derived from the latin for salt: sal

  • PetDinosaurs@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Can we first define “salad”?

    If it’s cold ingredients, mixed together, then wilted iceberg lettuce and a gas station dressing packet is salad.

    So two.

      • tromars@feddit.de
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        1 year ago

        I‘m German and have eaten a lot of potato salad during my entire life. Not once has it been served hot

        • SevFTW@feddit.de
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          1 year ago

          Not hot but „lauwarm“ or „lukewarm“ is very typical for same day fresh potato salad

          At least down here in the south

      • blackbrook@mander.xyz
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        1 year ago

        I’m not gonna claim a salad can’t be hot, but I think of pasta salads as a cold dish. Maybe it depends where your from.

        Potato salad is generally cold too, but there is also hot German potato salad.

  • The Giant Korean@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Something in a bowl with a dressing is salad.

    • Tomatoes + balsamic + olive oil = salad
    • Romaine + Caesar dressing = salad
    • Canned tuna + mayo = salad
    • Cucumber + rice wine vin + sesame oil = salad

    Salad is more fun with multiple ingredients, but everything up there is still salad

  • Saraphim@lemmy.world
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    1 year ago

    Two ingredients must be present for something to be a salad - a vegetable and a dressing. I make all sorts of salads. Some have lettuce, some don’t. I make salad with just fennel and an oil/vinegar dressing. I make salad with tomatoes & cucumbers with a dressing. What she ate was 100% a salad. This is a weird fight.

    • Brekky@lemmy.world
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      1 year ago

      I dont do dressings. What do you call 15 ingredients and no dressing? A fryless stir fry? Genuinely curious if there’s a word now!

      • Saraphim@lemmy.world
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        1 year ago

        I feel like that’s a grey area because it’s called salad but only in the context a product with dressing (the mayo). but it’s not really a salad, it’s just called chicken salad the way Kraft dinner isn’t really a dinner but it could be a dinner. I say if it only has chicken and mayo, that’s not a salad, that’s a sandwich filling. If it has celery, onion, etc, you could make the argument it was salad.