The Salads Are Not an Afterthought
July 9, 2026 · Jay De Natale
I'll be honest with you. The salads we had before were fine. Inoffensive. The kind of thing you order when you feel like you should eat something green. Airport terminal energy. Not bad, just not something anyone was excited about. That bothered me.
If I'm going to put something on the menu it has to earn its spot. Not as a courtesy item. Not as something for the person at the table who "doesn't want pizza." It has to be something you'd actually choose on its own terms.
So we went back and built two salads from scratch. The Sloppy Caesar and the Spring Stracci. Both landed exactly where I wanted them.
The Sloppy Caesar
The Sloppy Caesar is the Caesar I actually want to eat. Less lemon, no anchovies, more cheese, more cream. Rich and unapologetic. The croutons are made from our pizza dough, same 48-hour ferment, same Caputo flour, cut and toasted until they have real bite. Not the foam squares that come out of a bag. It's called Sloppy because it is. That's a feature.
The Spring Stracci
This one started as an excuse to get more stracciatella on the menu. I'm not embarrassed about that. Stracciatella is the soft cream from inside burrata. If you've had it you know, it's rich, milky, slightly tangy, and it makes everything around it better. We put a serious amount of it right in the middle of the bowl.
The rest of the salad is built to hold up next to it. Spring greens and romaine, really good olive oil, balsamic, cherry tomatoes. Bright and clean. The stracciatella lands in the center and you work through it as you go. It feels like a treat. That was the goal.
Why this matters
Venice has no shortage of places selling you a $22 salad that leaves you vaguely unsatisfied. Lots of greens, a protein, a dressing that tastes like it came from a bottle, and a price that makes you feel like you did something responsible. That's not what we're doing.
Both of these salads cost less than that. Both of them are more interesting. Both of them are things I'd order on a day when I wasn't even thinking about a diet, just thinking about what sounds good.
That's the bar. Not virtuous. Not responsible. Just genuinely delicious and worth getting excited about.
Order them
Both salads are available now for pickup and delivery. We deliver across Venice, Santa Monica, Mar Vista, Marina del Rey, Culver City, and Playa Vista. The Spring Stracci pairs well with the plain mootz if you're doing a full order. The Sloppy Caesar goes with everything.
Come in. Try them. Tell me what you think.
- Jay