GUY FIERI IS PREPARING A SENSIBLE SALAD.
It’s nearing lunchtime at Fieri’s 42-acre compound in California’s wine country, a stretch of rolling Steinbeckian earth that is the 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue of Flavortown, U. S.A. Fieri is dressed in a black tee and dripping silver bling as he commands the outdoor kitchen in his backyard. Wood in a Santa Maria grill is kicking up flames. A bulbous brick oven is at full tilt. And Fieri, knife in hand, is hot on this salad. He slivers fennel into white toothpicks. He chops herbs, slices a Fresno chile thin, and cubes Medjool dates.
“All the colors! All the flavors! All the textures!” he says in the same near-yell you’ve heard if you’ve watched TV in the past two decades. Next, he rough-cuts grapefruit and orange slices. “And pistachios for crunch,” he adds, dumping everything into a big silver mixing bowl. “A quick vinaigrette of Dijon, vinegar, olive oil, fresh pepper, and salt” goes in, too. “You don’t need that much dressing. Flavor comes from the pink grapefruit and orange.” He uses tongs to claw and spin the mix together clockwise.
The resulting dish is a five-inch-tall rainbow-psychedelic pile of flavor heaped atop an ocean-blue platter. A salad with all the hallmarks of health: plant forward, nutrient dense, low calorie.
The side dish isn’t just damage control.
