Salad

If mini pita breads are unavailable in your area, split larger pita breads horizontally in half and cut out smaller pita rounds using a 3-inch-diameter biscuit cutter. You can streamline the process by preparing both the chicken salad and the toasted pita rounds one day in advance.

This recipe is an accompaniment for Seafood Salad with Collard Greens Slaw .

Feel free to create your own mesclun mix. We suggest baby red oakleaf, baby arugula, mâche, and bite-size pieces of Belgian endive, frisée, and radicchio.

Ginger and sesame lend an Asian accent.

If you can't find heirloom tomatoes near you, this salad would also be delicious with any ripe tomato from garden or market.

Nuts, lemon juice, and fresh herbs punch up this terrific side dish.

Serve with: Fresh sugar snap peas, grape tomato salad, and dinner rolls.

Paulette Sexton of Tustin, California, writes: "Although I've loved to cook since I was a kid, I didn't really hone my kitchen skills until my husband and I started entertaining frequently. When we were first married, we had dinner parties several times a week — it got to the point where people would call me around 4:30 in the afternoon and ask, 'What's for dinner?' We're still having people over and we're still informal, especially in the summer. Everyone sits around the large island in our kitchen, drinking wine and eating appetizers. Usually there's grilled chicken or fish or a simple main-course salad for dinner. It's our favorite menu."

Two kinds of just-cooked peas and an Asian dressing make one delicious salad.

Active time: 15 min Start to finish: 25 min

Based on a recipe passed down from Anna Pump's Danish grandmother, this European-style potato salad is dressed with a mustardy vinaigrette along with capers, chives, and fresh parsley.

Using stale pita will keep the bread from getting soggy in the salad.

Yam Taeng Kwa Dried shrimp are an acquired taste; they have a very strong fish flavor. But this salad is wonderfully refreshing even without the shrimp. Active time: 20 min Start to finish: 20 min

If you haven't already made the low-fat buttermilk dressing for the buffalo burgers you'll need to allow a little extra time for this recipe. Active time: 40 min Start to finish: 40 min

Active time: 30 min Start to finish: 30 min

I particularly like this version of whitefish salad, because there is no filler in it. Mark, a political consultant who served in the Carter White House, makes it for break-the-fast as well as during the year brunches.

Hungarian Jewish food is a perfect example of acculturation. Take this piquant cucumber salad, which can be made with one of the three different kinds of paprika — mild, sharp, or sweet. Taken there by the Turks who discovered it in the New World, paprika has been cultivated in Hungary since the sixteenth century.