Iceberg lettuce and flash drives are tools of the devile.
Burn them! Burn them!
What the hell is a “wedge salad”?
Nasty things, principally among them the aforesaid iceberg lettuce, hacked into “wedges” to support the “dressing” which is what the Great Unwashed prefer to salad with oil and vinegar.
People make wedge salads with oil + vinegar dressing? Usually it’s glopped up with tons o’ ranch dressing and bacon bits. Drowning the poor lettuce quarter in ranch isn’t doing it any favors, but oil + vinegar is about the worst you could do to iceberg. If you’re using it for salad, it needs some flavor.
Oil and vinegar? Ranch? What are you heathens talking about? Mister Rik’s link has it right…a wedge (being the only grudgingly acceptable way to actually eat the nastiness that is iceberg lettuce) has yummy ingredients to make it palatable: diced bacon, bleu cheese dressing/crumbles and tomatoes. I would make an argument for adding a fine mince of red onion, but its a minor quibble.
You hate iceberg lettuce? Fine. But please don’t tell me what I should like. It’s elitist and none of your business.
TO ME: iceberg is fine on a sandwich mixed with all the other ingredients of said sandwich. It mixes with the other ingredients and adds mouth feel, crunchiness, and moisture to things.
TO ME: iceberg is also perfectly acceptable in a salad mixed with other more interesting ingredients, including more interesting greens. Iceberg by itself is a horror of a salad, but it’s nice to have around for texture, at the very least as a Hamburger-helper of greens.
TO YOU: well, you disagree. I can live with that. But please don’t tell me what I should like.
My boss, the Executive Chef, would agree with you. I thought there were one or two other toppings, but it’s one of those dishes we’ve made exactly once (I work in catering, not a restaurant, where we have an ever-shifting menu), so I don’t remember it all that well.
I always have a at least one container of mixed salad leaves in the fridge but when an iceberg lettuce is called for that is what I use. Off hand I can think of 4 things I buy them for - fattoush, peas and wilted lettuce, egg salad sandwiches and san choy bow. For the first 3 I want no taste component from the lettuce. For the last I want that and the structure it wouldn’t be the same without the iceberg lettuce cups.
I always thought the traditional dressing for a wedge was blue cheese.
I keep waiting for an episode of Iron Chef where the Chairman that today’s secret ingredient is iceberg lettuce.
Morimoto would stalk off softly cursing in Japanese that it wasn’t actually food.
Well, I like Iceberg. It’s not my favourite lettuce in every context, but that would be impossible anyway.
And as Max the Immortal said - it’s not tasteless, it’s subtle. If you think it’s tasteless, you’re doing it wrong.
ETA: I also like it cooked - finely shredded and added to a noodle stirfry at the last minute, it’s really quite good.
In case you hadn’t noticed, we were having fun here. The grumpy gus section is over to your right.
And those are the guys that eat iceberg lettuce. And that’s why they are grumpy. When I get old I am going to live off of nothing but iceberg lettuce and PBR. And the kids in the neighborhood will fear me like no other.
Thank you thank you thank you for this! It has been one of my life’s missions to convince Americans that iceberg lettuce isn’t “real” lettuce! We’ve been tricked by restaurant advertising to believe that iceberg is the best lettuce, when they’re really buying it for pennies and charging us the same as romaine, spinach, or mesclun.
It has zero nutritional value and zero taste. It’s the Paula Poundstone of lettuces.
Iceberg lettuce is fine. I don’t like it on my burgers (don’t want any kind of lettuce on my hamburger), but it can be a nice, cool, refreshing salad green to have with a grilled dinner. I don’t use it as a vehicle for salad dressing. Just give it to me lightly dressed with oil & vinegar, and perhaps a little bit of tomato (if it’s fresh), and possibly cucumbers, and to me it’s a crunchy, watery counterpoint to the rest of my meal.
Iceberg is not an aggressively “green” tasting green, but it does have some flavor to it. And I don’t know what people suggesting celery are smoking if they think it somehow can function as a substitute for iceberg. The crunch is different, and the taste is completely different.
That said, when given the choice, usually I will opt for more bitter and limper greens, but when I want that watery crunch, I’ll take iceberg.
I completely agree. It has a subtle sweet flavor and a very unique texture.
People associate it with a time when other types of lettuces were not available. As a result, a lot of self-proclaimed “foodies” race to distance themselves from it now. Most of my chef friends agree that iceburg lettuce will always have a place at the table.
Iceberg - not needed for salads, I agree with this.
Iceberg - IS needed for burgers, BLTs, etc. For reasons already addressed, plus this one. 1 leaf of iceberg UNDER the hamburger pattie serves as a barrier to keep the juices from getting to that lower bun segment. Iceberg is way better at this than Romaine or Green Leaf.
Now you want to know what’s not fucking needed on a burger? Cheese, damn it!!
Dude - make it Old Style and you can be our neighbor!! We can have dinners together!
Most lettuce doesn’t have any more pronounced taste than iceberg. I mix other types into salad for nutritional value and color, but those crunchy iceberg hearts are what make the salad more than limp cow food.
That said, I would like to see non-iceberg heading lettuce (i.e. “buttercrunch” types) in the supermarket.