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German Salad (Bers and tomatoes alternately)
bers and tomatoes alternately in the dish. Serve with French dressing in a boat.
Mrs. Rorer's salad dressing is especially nice with this salad.
A composed salad of sliced cucumber and tomato, layered in a shallow dish and dressed at the table rather than tossed. The whole point is that the dressing arrives separately, so the vegetables stay crisp.
- Drain the cucumber firstSlice thin, salt lightly, let it stand 20-30 minutes, then pat dry. The recipe does not call for this, but undrained cucumber weeps water into the dish, which will thin any dressing spooned over it.
- "In a boat"A sauce boat or gravy boat, passed at table so each person dresses their own portion. A small pitcher does the same job.
- French dressing, period senseIn American books of this era French dressing means oil, vinegar, salt and pepper beaten together at roughly three parts oil to one of vinegar. It is not the sweet orange bottled dressing that later took the name.
- Mrs. Rorer's dressingSarah Tyson Rorer, a widely read American cookery writer, published a number of salad dressings, including plain French dressings, mayonnaise, and cooked dressings thickened with egg. Which one is meant here is not specified; a tart vinaigrette or a boiled dressing will serve.
- CucumbersSupermarket slicing cucumbers are usually waxed and should be peeled; English or Persian cucumbers can be left unpeeled and need less salting.
- TomatoesUse fully ripe fruit held at room temperature, sliced across into rounds of the same thickness as the cucumber so the layers sit flat. Cold storage flattens tomato flavour and firms the flesh.
- Assembly and yieldThe recipe says only to lay the slices alternately in the dish; overlapping them flat rather than piling them suits a shallow dish. No quantities are given, so scale to the dish.
- TimingArrange no more than half an hour ahead and keep it cool. Once dressed the salad should be eaten straight away.
"German salad" may have functioned as a loose label in American cookery writing, attached to almost any cold vegetable dish built on cucumber with vinegar, echoing the German-American Gurkensalat found in immigrant kitchens across the Midwest and Pennsylvania. The dressing is sent to table in a boat rather than worked into the salad in the kitchen, which leaves each diner to judge the acid. The offhand reference to Mrs. Rorer is a mark of the moment as well. Sarah Tyson Rorer of the Philadelphia Cooking School was so widely read that a writer could name her dressing without further explanation and expect to be understood.