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salad

[sal-uh d]
See more synonyms for salad on Thesaurus.com
noun
  1. a usually cold dish consisting of vegetables, as lettuce, tomatoes, and cucumbers, covered with a dressing and sometimes containing seafood, meat, or eggs.
  2. any of various dishes consisting of foods, as meat, seafood, eggs, pasta, or fruit, prepared singly or combined, usually cut up, mixed with a dressing, and served cold: chicken salad; potato salad.
  3. any herb or green vegetable, as lettuce, used for salads or eaten raw.
  4. South Midland and Southern U.S. greens(def 22b).
  5. any mixture or assortment: The usual salad of writers, artists, and musicians attended the party.
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Origin of salad

1350–1400; Middle English salad(e) < Middle French salade < Old Provençal salada < Vulgar Latin *salāta, feminine past participle of *salāre to salt, equivalent to sal-, stem of sāl salt1 + -āta -ate1
Dictionary.com Unabridged Based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2018

Examples from the Web for salad

Contemporary Examples

Historical Examples

  • The lotus is a leguminous plant—so excellent for the salad—not for the roast.

    The Spenders

    Harry Leon Wilson

  • Any salad dressing that is preferred may be served with them.

    Woman's Institute Library of Cookery, Vol. 4

    Woman's Institute of Domestic Arts and Sciences

  • If the salad is large more oil and more juice should be used.

    Her Father's Daughter

    Gene Stratton-Porter

  • Fill your salad bowl with the crisp leaves, from which the flowerhead has been plucked.

    Her Father's Daughter

    Gene Stratton-Porter

  • Here is a salad that would have intrigued the palate of Lucullus, himself.

    Her Father's Daughter

    Gene Stratton-Porter

British Dictionary definitions for salad

salad

noun
  1. a dish of raw vegetables, such as lettuce, tomatoes, etc, served as a separate course with cold meat, eggs, etc, or as part of a main course
  2. any dish of cold vegetables or fruitpotato salad; fruit salad
  3. any green vegetable used in such a dish, esp lettuce
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Word Origin

C15: from Old French salade, from Old Provençal salada, from salar to season with salt, from Latin sal salt
Collins English Dictionary - Complete & Unabridged 2012 Digital Edition © William Collins Sons & Co. Ltd. 1979, 1986 © HarperCollins Publishers 1998, 2000, 2003, 2005, 2006, 2007, 2009, 2012

Word Origin and History for 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" (see salt (n.)).

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.

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Online Etymology Dictionary, © 2010 Douglas Harper