Waldorf Salad
This salad is one of the most famous American salads. The Waldorf salad is named after the Waldorf Astoria Hotel, where it was created for a charity ball in New York City in 1896, created by Oscar Tschirky. The original recipe consisted of only 3 ingredients, sliced celery, diced skinned red apples and mayonnaise. Walnuts and grapes were added later to this salad. Lots of well-known chefs recreated this salad, adding something to the ingredients or just changed the proportion.
Oscar Tschirky was born in Switzerland and moved to the United States in 1883. He has become an icon, he was “Oscar of the Waldorf”. He wrote in the foreword of his biography by Karl Schriftgiesser:
“What I have done from the day of my arrival in this great country, is to be a hotel man. That’s title enough for me and one that I am very proud to hold. My life has been one continuous trek between the chef, the kitchen, and the dining room, with many a detour to the parts of the house. If you must have a word for it, the best I can offer is maître d’hôtel.”
I suggest this book, because it is a very amusing reading, you can learn history and culinary, take a look behind the scenes of the Waldorf Astoria Hotel through Oscar’s life.
I served my version of Waldorf Salad on a bed of gem salad and decorated with some slices of tangerine.
Waldorf Salad
Ingredients
- 2 stalks celery thinly sliced
- 2 red apple cored and diced
- 120 gram red grapes cut in half
- 120 gram walnut chopped
- 5 tbsp home-made mayo
- 2 tsp French mustard
- 2 tsp honey
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ tsp black pepper freshly ground
- 1 gem salad
- 1 tangerine
Instructions
- Gently stir the thinly sliced celery, diced apple, grapes and chopped walnut in a medium sized bowl.
- Whisk mayonnaise with mustard, honey, salt and pepper in other bowl.
- Pour over the celery mix with the mayonnaise mixture and stir gently.
- Place the leaves of gem salad into bowls.
- Put the Waldorf Salad on the bed of gem salad.
- Peel the tangerine, partition into sections and decorate the top of the salad.