re: Is the fig overrated or underrated?

quote:

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Serious question (not meant as a shot), but what makes something a "salad?" I have had some butternut squash salads that have very limited kale in them, so I said that justified it as a salad. Are there more indicators? I've never understood that

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Your question made me curious, so I started looking.

Per MW:

Definition of salad
1 : any of various usually cold dishes: such as
a : raw greens (such as lettuce) often combined with other vegetables and toppings and served especially with dressing
b : small pieces of food (such as pasta, meat, fruit, or vegetables) usually mixed with a dressing (such as mayonnaise) or set in gelatin
2 : a green vegetable or herb grown for salad
especially : LETTUCE
3 : a usually incongruous mixture : HODGEPODGE

Etymology:

salad (n.)
late 14c., from Old French salade (14c.), from Vulgar Latin *salata, literally "salted," short for herba salata "salted vegetables" (vegetables seasoned with brine, a popular Roman dish), from fem. past participle of *salare "to salt," from Latin sal (genitive salis) "salt" (from PIE root *sal- "salt").

Dutch salade, German Salat, Swedish salat, Russian salat are from Romanic languages. Salad days "time of youthful inexperience" (perhaps on notion of "green") is first recorded 1606 in Shakespeare and probably owes its survival, if not its existence, to him. Salad bar first attested 1940, American English.

Figs, blue cheese and roasted pecans. Winner.