Acadiana’s Best Specialty Salads – 10 We Suggest You Try Today

(KMDL-FM) The word salad is not a dirty word in Cajun culture and Cajun cuisine. It's just not a word that is used a lot unless you're talking about "potato" and mixing it with gumbo. But despite our deep-fried reputation for avoiding healthy things, we do love a good salad here in the heart of Cajun Country.

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Granted, our salad selections don't get the public push that our boudin, cracklins, rice and gravy, and other more established dishes get; they are still worth talking about. Because a true specialty salad in South Louisiana is more of a meal than it is something on the side.

How Exactly Do You "Cajunize" a Salad?

Our salad bars where you build your own salad tend to have some interesting items on them as well. Yeah, we Cajunize them. You probably wouldn't see some of the pickled or peppered items we serve with our salads at, say, a truck stop in Iowa. But if they aren't on offer with a salad down here, the manager will be called.

READ MORE: 10 Meals That Show What Life in South Louisiana Is All About

Here along the bayou, we tend to like our salads garden fresh with a nice crisp pop to the veggies. We like the dressings to be bold and not shy about why they are on our plates. We expect the add-ons to literally bring something to the table and not just occupy space or provide color. We also like our portions to be large.

How Were Acadiana's Best Specialty Salads Chosen for This List?

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To curate the list we're about to present to you, we polled many of you via online quizzes and questionnaires. We looked at your reviews and comments on social media and food sites dedicated to great food. We also ventured into the reviews on Yelp! and TravelAdvisor, and we did some snooping around the Eat Lafayette website as well.

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We think we have a great list of what we're calling specialty salads. In other words, the salad is created by someone with culinary talent and serves as a singular dish. Let us know which ones you've tried, which ones we left off, and,d of course, any suggestions on what we might include in the sequel because we all know limiting it to 10 isn't going to provide enough space. 

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But at least we can get the salad conversation started.