You might’ve noticed that a good number of the dinner recipes in my repertoire end with the same note…

“Serve with a simple green salad.” It sounds boring and afterthought-y, but I’ve realized something recently: The simple green salad, like the one you see above, is an unsung hero at dinnertime, playing a crucial role on the plate — not just by checking the “vegetables” box on your mental mealtime checklist, but by providing brightness, texture, and contrast to whatever it accompanies. This is especially the case as we head into the fall and start gravitating towards main dishes that one might describe as “roasty” and “braised” and “hearty.”

The salad recipe below features gem lettuce, radishes, cucumbers, scallions, and a lemon-Dijon dressing, and appears on my table nine out of ten times I’m making a dinner that begs to be rounded out by a bowl of greens. Would it be delicious with feta and pistachios? Yes. Apples and cheddar? Toasted buckwheat and a quartered heirloom tomato? Yes and yes. Would a sliced avocado or a creamy mayo- or yogurt-based dressing give it a hit of indulgence? Of course. But all of that is beside the point. The role of the simple salad is threefold: a) to offset the richness of your lasagnas or cheesy pizzas, or roast chickens b) to be easy to throw together (I’m not breaking out the blender to make a weeknight salad dressing) and c) to offer something fresh, i.e. raw, bright, crunchy — my number one rule for achieving greatness on the plate. Here’s how I make it.

A Simple Green Salad
A few important things to achieve optimum salad status: Make sure your greens are dried completely. Season them with salt and pepper before you add the dressing. Lastly, many salad purists will tell you to add the dressing to the serving bowl first, then add the greens and toss, which helps avoid weighing down the lettuce with dressing. I prefer to add the salad ingredients first, then drizzle the dressing around the perimeter of the bowl so most of it slides to the bottom. Then I toss everything gently, adding more in a similar fashion if necessary. It’s easier to gauge how much dressing I need that way. Serves 4.

12 ounces delicate lettuce such as gem (shown) or Bibb/Boston, washed and dried completely and torn into bitesize pieces
2 small Persian cucumbers, sliced as thinly as possible
4 small radishes, sliced as thinly as possible
1 bunch (6-8) scallions, light green and white parts, minced (or 2 tablespoons minced red onion)
kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
Lemon-Dijon Dressing (recipe below)

Add the lettuce, cucumbers, radishes, and scallions to a deep salad bowl and season with salt and pepper. Drizzle about half the dressing around the edges of the bowl so it sinks to the bottom and mostly avoids the lettuce. Using salad tongs, toss the salad gently, scraping the dressing up from the bottom of the bowl to distribute. Add more dressing as necessary until the lettuce is lightly dressed.

Lemon-Dijon Dressing
1/4 cup lemon juice (from about 1 1/2 lemons)
1 1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 1/2 teaspoon honey (or sugar to make vegan)
1/3 cup olive oil
kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper

In a small jar or measuring cup, shake or whisk the lemon juice, Dijon mustard, honey, salt and pepper. Once mixed, shake or whisk  olive oil into jar in steady stream until emulsified.

P.S. Five ways to upgrade a regular green salad and a magic grid of salad dressing and ten fast fall dinners.