Whatever Happened to ... 1993 : Revisiting some of View’s most talked-about stories, we find progress for anxious parents and neon signs, second thoughts about a controversial sect - and pregnant women still craving “magic” salad. : Nation Craves Mom-to-Be Salad

It started innocently enough. One overdue pregnant woman bypassed the pizza and pasta at Caioti, a funky Laurel Canyon restaurant, and instead ordered the crisp Romaine and Watercress Salad. Next day, she went into labor, convinced that the salad, with its strong balsamic vinegar dressing, had somehow quickened the process.

Soon, she told pregnant friends about the salad.

Who told their pregnant friends.

Which birthed an urban myth: the labor-inducing salad.

Before long, at least eight women had credited the salad with escalating Mother Nature’s pace.

In a story about the salad (“Power Lunch?” View, June 15, 1993), local obstetricians speculated that it could be more than wishful thinking, that balsamic vinegar might contain substances that cause the uterus to contract.

Since then, Caioti owner Ed LaDou has been happily going crazy, feeding some 20 pregnant women a day, filling long-distance telephone orders for his “magic” salad dressing, warning waitresses not to make medical claims and playing phone shrink to callers who wail: “What if this doesn’t work?”

LaDou has been surprised by the reaction. “I went out to get the paper that morning and by the time I got home, NBC had called,” LaDou recalls, interrupting to take a telephone interview request from a Toronto radio station. Other media followed suit: Newsweek, Playboy, Esquire, Globe, Woman’s World and Parenting all called or carried reports, LaDou says. There was plenty of television coverage, too, including CNN, “The Home Show,” local newscasts and, most recently, a Japanese network.

“Some days, the film crews in here looked like tag teams,” says LaDou. “One would set up while the other broke down. And I must have done 30 radio interviews.”

Overdue women from faraway states begged LaDou to ship the dressing and provide the salad recipe. He did, to the tune of about 2,000 orders, charging $10 for a bottle of dressing and the salad recipe, another $25 to cover Federal Express charges.

There is still a constant stream of pregnant women, alerted by friends or even midwives. “It’s been good for business,” says LaDou, estimating overall sales are up 10% this year.

Of course, no can yet say whether mom’s 11th-hour salad fling will affect baby’s tastes. Pam Pepper, one mom who credits the salad with helping induce labor, says her son Blake Pepper-Nahman won’t touch salad, which she thinks is pretty typical for a 14-month-old.

Meanwhile, LaDou is busy with his own unanswered question: “How do I top maternity salad?”