Beautiful winter salads

With a gorgeous palette of Italian winter greens showing up on the produce aisle, it's a great time to improvise salads starring them.

Happy Monday, delicately bitter cook!

My apologies for sending this after the weekend; I was in San Luis Obispo, California for the last few days, and couldn’t tear myself away from great friends long enough to pull together this missive. Which is about . . .

Castelfranco! Lusia radicchio! Rosa radicchio!

For the first time ever, I’m finding glorious Italian chicories beyond the usual Chioggia radicchio in my local supermarket — not in New York City, or L.A., or San Luis Obispo, or another produce-happy destination, but in Dallas, Texas.

Maybe you’re finding them, too?

These winter greens look so painterly — Castelfranco, with its maroon-splattered ecru leaves, or Treviso radicchio, eggplant-purple streaked with white. They remind me of tulips painted by a Dutch master.

In case you’re not already acquainted with them, the flavor of these Italian-speaking chicories is delicately bitter, and their …