Man I hate this lettuce. Why is it so popular? It tastes like nothing, has little to no nutritional value outside of maybe roughage and besides a yummy wedge salad (which is only yummy because of bleu cheese crumbles and diced tomatoes and bacon) has very little practical utility IMO.
I mean, maybe a leaf of it on a burger is all right, but I can think of better things to dress a burger with.
With so many yummy leaf lettuces, mustard greens, spring mixes, arugula, frissee, etc available…why eat this shit?
Me. There is no excuse for the persistence of iceberg lettuce in this day and age. Even a wedge salad can be improved by putting the toppings on a bed greens that have actual flavor.
Seriously, iceberg lettuce is why I grew up hating salad and why I didn’t realize I could love salad until some time in my mid-'20s.
The same for me with salad dressing served by Mama Plant and discovering mayonnaise with the help of the New and Improved Mrs. Plant in 1982.
(There was a long waiting time.)
Romaine is fine…not the greatest lettuce but a clear step above iceberg. It least it has a slight bitter tinge of flavor. Iceberg tastes like nothing but crunchy water (band name?). There’s a restaurant here that does wood-fired, grilled hearts of romaine Caeser salads and its fucking amazing.
I am guilty of partaking of the same thing I am bitching about at higher-end steak houses…in the form of a wedge salad. The iceberg lettuce basically serves as a crunchy, edible plate/delivery system for bleu cheese, tomatoes and bacon, so its tolerable…
…but I also agree with this. I have never seen a wedge served with any other lettuce (and I realize that the presentation of it “requires” a huge chunk of head lettuce to “look right”…but plenty of foodie places deconstruct traditional presentations, so…) but I’d be excited to try a different take on the “classic”.
I hate it because of its ubiquitousness and persistence. And I hate those damn stems too. They are even worse that the pale green leaves.
At best, iceberg can serve a useful purpose as a filler mixed with other quality greens to enlarge a salad in say, a restaurant house salad mix, for instance. But that’s about it.
Where are the iceberg defenders? The gauntlet has been thrown!
Husband is an iceberg enthusiast, I’m afraid. Only iceberg is “real lettuce” to him, he will tolerate other greens that are actually…green, but if given the option always prefers good old’ iceberg.
I’ve tried, with results similar to the Titanic’s.
People like iceberg lettuce for its texture not its taste. Its “crunch” gives it a good mouthfeel.
You might argue, so what? But in a salad the dressing is going to provide ninety percent of the taste anyway. The lettuce often just serves as a foundation to carry the dressing. So the texture of the lettuce can be more important than its flavor.
I wholehearteadly agree with the OP, but I have two people in my household who demand that I purchase this disgusting stuff. They say they like the crunch.No, they will not accept celery. They want the iceberg, and yes they will tolerate my addition of an approved amount of either spinach (100% of my salad) or maybe, MAYBE some romaine or green leaf if I get uppity.
Iceberg lettuce has a pleasing texture that is appropriate for many recipes. It has a very subtle flavor, but if you think it has no flavor whatsoever, your palate is deficient.
Iceberg is the Wonder white bread or boneless/skinless chicken breast of the vegetable world.
Its purpose is simply to support the other elements. It is the stage the actors perform on. It is the chip that carries the dip. It fulfills this role exceptionally well.
I’ve grown to like the taste of iceberg. It might have to do with realizing that if you can’t taste the iceberg, you’ve got WAY too much dressing. And the crunch is quite nice. I still want some dark greens mixed in there for flavor, though.
It’s funny. I recently ordered a salad at a beer-and-BBQ type place recently, and the waitress told me, very tentatively, “Just so you know, that salad doesn’t have iceberg lettuce, it’s mixed greens.” She seemed surprised when I said that was fine.
Now I can just picture someone flying into a rage because their salad didn’t have iceberg lettuce. “What is this dark green crap?! I can’t eat this…”
I disagree. There are some very delicately flavored salad dressings out there (admittedly, mostly homemade or at nice restaurants, not thick Ranch crap that most people buy at grocery stores, but that’s another thread) that do not obscure the flavor of the other components in a salad. Problem is, if iceberg is a component, it HAS no flavor!
Put Captain Crunch in their salads and tell them to shut the fuck up.
I have to agree that the texture is okay…there’s not too many other lettuces I can think of that have that same snap texture when bitten, but that textural strength is its flavor weakness in that it is only present due to being bloated with so much flavorless water.
Eh…maybe. Shred a little into some tuna salad and I won’t complain. The shit sucks, though, particularly in salads, which I am loving making/eating more and more as I age. Iceberg adds nothing of value to those other than the aforementioned filler.
Maybe my palate is deficient, but iceberg tastes like crunchy, watery nothingness to me.
“What the hell is this? I ordered a salad, not a bunch of weeds!”
What is terrible is going to some non-chain restaurant out on the great plains and their idea of a “salad” is this big solid wedge of iceberg lettuce. <shudder>
Iceberg has its place in a salad, much more so than the lawn clippings that most “reaching for class” places fill their salads with these days. I don’t want to see dandelion, cress, endive or escarole anywhere near my salad. Iceberg, romaine, maybe a little Bibb. That’s it.
You can have my iceberg when you pry it from my cold, dead hands that clutch my fork.
This is completely leaving out shredded for tacos, taco salads, hamburgers, etc.
“Out on the great plains”? Are you mocking flyover country, sir/ma’am?
The gloves are off now! Just because people around here think haute cuisine involves casseroles that might include: marshmallows, Jello with vegetables, anything with locally hunted deer meat or something akin to scrapple/goetta does NOT mean we cannot appreciate proper salad greens sir!
I respectfully request that you retract your derogatory and inflammatory statement and apologize unreservedly!
