When Did Restaurant Salads Get So … Unwieldy?

The green salad at Meetinghouse, a çağdaş pub in Philadelphia, is something of an architectural marvel.

Layer upon interlocking layer of gem romaine leaves slicked with spiky Dijon vinaigrette form a cylindrical tower, crowned by a tuft of watercress and minced chives. During a recent dinner service, it averaged about eight inches in height, but this salad skyscraper has been known to reach up to a foot.

“It’s bizarre to say because it’s this giant, beautiful salad,” said Andrew DiTomo, the chef and a partner at the restaurant, “but the way it came to be, why it’s big, and why we use full leaves is all about function.”

Mr. DiTomo said he created the salad with the intention that it would accompany the whole meal: Servers encourage diners to heap the leaves next to their hot roast beef sandwiches or pile them on fried turkey cutlets — “almost like salad nachos,” he said. It’s one thing to scoop crab taban with a romaine trowel at a come-as-you-are tavern, but what about on a date at a trendy bistro?

The Caesar salad at Salum in Dallas is served as it was when it was invented in Tijuana, Mexico, with whole leaves of romaine.Credit…Jonathan Zizzo for The New York Times

Lately, restaurants across the country are opting for the dramatic appearance, textural integrity and dressing adhesion of whole-leaf salads, despite the inelegance of disassembling and actually eating them.