Salad Definition & Meaning

American

British

Etymology

Examples

Related Words

Synonyms salad American [sal-uhd] / ˈsæl əd /

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.

5. any mixture or assortment.

   The usual salad of writers, artists, and musicians attended the party.

salad British / ˈsæləd /

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 fruit

   potato salad

   fruit salad

3. any green vegetable used in such a dish, esp lettuce

"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

Etymology

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 salt 1 + -āta -ate 1

Example Sentences

Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.

A California food manufacturer is recalling thousands of cases of salad dressing distributed to major retailers over potential contamination from “foreign objects.”

From Los Angeles Times

In the mood for a fresh, homemade salad?

From Salon

They have this great Chinese chicken salad and spam musubi and other Hawaiian food that is so good.

From Los Angeles Times

Even the brighter dishes — the lemony pasta, the zesty black bean salad — are about steadiness as much as sparkle: reliable, make-ahead, happy to wait for you.

From Salon

This year, somehow, I careened straight from verdant, crisp summer food — cucumber salads, crisp chicken Caesar wraps, yogurt bowls, smoothies — into the warm-orange-and-brown spectrum of winter.

From Salon

Related Words

• potato salad

Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023

Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.