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Published Wednesday September 18, 2002 A Pinch and A Dash: Thunderbird salad's classic taste can now be duplicated at home BY JANE PALMER
WORLD-HERALD STAFF WRITER

The thunderbird of North American mythology produces thunder, lightning and rain.

The salad named for the giant bird garners almost as much attention with a richly satisfying dressing and bacon, tomato, chives and cheese toppings.

Private clubs in the Omaha area have served Thunderbird salads since the 1960s. In the 1980s, the Redick Grill in downtown Omaha served the Thunderbird as its house salad.

But duplicating the salad at home has been difficult, because few diners knew how to make the dressing.

Now a commercial version of the dressing is coming to market from Villamonte Cuisine of Omaha. Six Hy-Vee Food Stores stock the family-size bottles. (Villamonte also sells gallon jugs to restaurants.)

Steven Luis Villamonte, a certified executive chef and the owner of Villamonte Cuisine, developed the dressing with a mayonnaise-based recipe of his father's. The late Luis Villamonte was a chef and worked for years at the Happy Hollow Country Club.

Villamonte says some of his earliest memories are of accompanying his father to work at the club. Sonia Wade, the club's pantry cook, looked after the young assistant and taught him how to assemble the salad and make radish roses.

"When a server called out for a 'T-bird,' I would prepare and plate it," Villamonte says. "I did not have a written recipe until many years later when my father gave it to me. I have always loved the salad and realized most people who try it develop the desire for the Thunderbird fix."

Villamonte says his father helped to introduce the Thunderbird in other parts of the United States.

"He was what younger chefs refer to as an 'old-school foreign chef' with a temper," Villamonte says. "When he got mad, we moved. From state to state and club to club, I watched him introduce the Thunderbird salad. It always became the house salad and remained the house salad after he left."

As Omaha Press Club manager, Villamonte notices that about 25 percent of the lunches there include a request for the Thunderbird salad as a first course, side dish or main dish.

Some patrons have their T-birds topped with grilled shrimp, chicken breast or salmon.

Other foods can get the Thunderbird "treatment" of bacon, tomato, cheese, chives and Thunderbird dressing. Thunderbird hamburgers, Thunderbird coleslaw and Thunderbird baked potatoes taste great, the chef says.

Here is the chef's recipe for the classic salad.

Thunderbird Salad
4 cups packed, chopped, iceberg or romaine lettuce
2 tablespoons chopped chives
2 tablespoons chopped, cooked bacon
¹/₂ cup shredded mozzarella cheese
Optional: 1 tablespoon blue cheese, crumbled
¹/₂ medium tomato, diced
3 ounces Thunderbird salad dressing
Homemade croutons
Garnish: sliced or chopped avocado

In a large salad bowl, toss together lettuce, chives, bacon, cheese, tomato and dressing. Garnish with croutons and avocado. Serve immediately. Makes four servings.