I enjoy sliced, crisp-fried chicken with mine. I always eat it with chicken and homemade croutons - big squares of toast fried simply in garlic oil.
If you ate it with fish or meat, would it still be good? Would it be Caesar?
There seems to be several schools about the sauce. Some base it on mayo, while others base it on olive oil. Some recipes have huge amounts of garlic, others none. Worcestershire sauce or not seems to be something people feel strongly about. Parmesan is the biggest uniter here.
Personally, I usually make a sauce that´s mostly mayo and parmesan, with a lot of garlic and some lemon juice and Worcestershire for a little kick. I like to mix it very smooth. Some people tell me this is pretty far from genuine Caesar.
Traditionally, a Caesar sallad is just lettuce. I usually add some tomatoes as well - it just looks so boring if I don´t. Do you add any vegetables?
And is there any way a Caesar Sallad work with any other cheese?
I always eat all the chicken first. I don’t eat cold meat, so it needs to be eaten quickly before it gets cold. If the chicken starts cold, I won’t eat it.
I prefer light dressings that make it easier to disperse throughout the salad and not become too obvious; I don’t know much about what goes in to make it, but I’m not a fan of really thick Caesar dressings.
Also, the Caesar salad was invented in the 20th century in Mexico by a guy whose first name was Caesar. It bugs me to no end to see Caesar dressing with classical references on its label.
Well, “Caesar salad, the lunch of Mexican restaurateurs” doesn´t quite have the same ring to it. ;o
Although, as a quick Google search informs me, the Caesar in question was an Italian immigrant, and for all we know could have been a direct descendant of Big Jules hisself.
Caesar salad is what I usually order when I don´t know what to get at a regular restaurant. Sort of like the chicken curry at an Indian, or the yakiniku at a Japanese. Caesar salad is a pretty simple dish, so if the restaurant´s any good, the Caesar will be good, and if it isn´t, the other stuff won´t be either.
There was a place in DC (Georgtown on M Street) that had a delicious oyster Caesar. The oysters were lightly fried. I don’t like tomatoes in general so I prefer Caesars without 'em, but don’t know enough about the dressing to have a preference.
I would like to think it’s still a Caesar even with the oysters, but I can understand the thinking that the only proper Caesar is romaine, parmesan, and the dressing. It’s good just by itself.
Hmm, interesting. In the Martha Smith recipe, you don´t mix the cheese into the dressing - that´s all done in the salad bowl. Many recipes I´ve tried have you mix half of the cheese with the dressing and the rest in the bowl. The thing with the two forks sounds… intriguing as well.
Oyster Caesar sounds delicious! In fact, I want to try some different things on top of Caesar salad and see what happens. I often put in bacon as well as chicken - bacon and chicken go together pretty well.
The latest Cook’s Illustrated (from the people at America’s Test Kitchen) ran a two page spread on “Classic Caesar Salad.”
They mention that it was invented 90-odd years ago by Caesar Cardini (or his brother). The article says the original version has been all but eclipsed by ersatz variations that throw in chicken or fish, bind the salad in pita wraps, or squeeze it into BLT’s. They wanted to strip away the “superfluous trappings” from most modern recipes and return to the basics.
The Cook’s version uses garlic paste, fresh lemon juice, Worcestershire sauce, 1 tablespoon minced anchovies, 2 egg yolks, canola oil, extra-virgin olive oil, fine Parmesan, black pepper and romaine hearts. Oh, and they fried up the croutons themselves.
Interesting that they split the Parmesan and put some in the dressing and passed the rest around for people us use as they saw fit.
Not Martha Smith… Martha STEWART. And her recipe is THE classic recipe. You don’t make a “dressing”; you do everything in the bowl. In them old-timey fancy-schmancy restaurants, the waiter did it at table side.
The classic Caesar has ONLY the ingredients in Martha Stewart’s recipe- no oysters, chicken, or anything else. This is the real McCoy… try it her way at least once. It is sublime.
Hmm. The only difference between Martha Stewart and Cook’s Illustrated seems to be the Dijon mustard.
All the other ingredients seem to be in the ballpark. And yes, they whipped it up at the table.
I really like a anchovy flavor to the salad. The best Caesar I had was topped with really thin mini-filets of anchovy that were just the right consistency to not be too gross. Salty and delicious (and definitely NO tomatoes on Caesar!!)
I did not look at the other recipes on the sites linked, but this is how we have always done it:
Crush 3-4 Croutons into the bottom of the salad bowl.
Add:
1-2 cloves crushed garlic
Olive oil 3-4 Tbsp
Red Wine Vinegar 1 Tbsp
1/2 tsp Dijon Mustard
Splash of lemon juice
Splash of Red Hot
Splash of Worcestershire
Mix together, should be thick and able to stick to the lettuce.
Add romaine lettuce, toss. Add croutons and Parmesan cheese to top of salad.