Add These Curly Greens To Bring Tasty Bitter Notes To Your Salads

Great salads are refreshing and delicious, but perhaps the best part about them is the endless array of greens and vegetables you can throw into the bowl that go far beyond overused romaine and cherry tomatoes. When it comes to the many greens that are perfect for salads, we tend to turn to familiar ingredients like kale for crunch or spinach for its mildly sweet flavor. Frisée, however, is the perfect addition when you're ready for some slightly bitter notes.

You might know frisée as curly endive because it's in the vegetable family known as chicory, which includes traditional endive and radicchio. Their complementary flavors are why these ingredients are often paired together in a variety of salad recipes. Frisée itself offers bitter and peppery notes that pair well with ingredients like poached eggs, vegetables like asparagus, and a vinaigrette salad dressing to finish off the dish. The greens will also bring some crunch to your salad, which helps if you are using other more leafy greens in the bowl like butter lettuce. Although, you can pair frisée with any ingredients that will satisfy your salad cravings.

To pick the freshest frisée at the grocery store, look for bright-green outer leaves and steer clear of any bunch that has black or brown spots. Just like with all veggies, rinse off and dry frisée before it joins the other ingredients. Stick with the green leaves, because the yellowish heart of frisée tends to be far too bitter to enjoy raw in a salad. Either use your hands or a sharp knife and cut the frisée leaves into smaller pieces so they're easy to manage with a salad fork.

A classic salad to include the vegetable in is a frisée aux lardons, a staple in many French bistros with poached eggs, bacon, baguette, and a vinaigrette made with Dijon mustard. Try our frisée salad with pickled rhubarb and radishes for a dish that pairs the greens with pickled rhubarb, almonds, and fresh mint. Frisée also stands out in our chicory salad with orange and walnuts that introduces tangy acidity and crunch along with the bitter notes from the frisée.