I’ve never been much of a tossed-salad eater, especially those made by other people or in restaurants, because I’m not overly fond of a lot of the raw veggies that tend to go into those things: cabbage, onions, tomato, cucumber, etc. But I do like a nice Caesar salad. In my experience and to my best knowledge, here’s what goes into a traditional Caesar salad:
- Romaine lettuce
- shredded or shaved Parmesan
- croutons
- Caesar dressing (a creamy, garlicky affair with black pepper), lightly coating the entire salad rather than served on the side or glopped on top
- optional: cracked pepper, cooked chicken
Yesterday, Mr. S and I stopped in to the local diner, which, while not a four-star establishment by any means, usually does a tolerable impression of most foods and has a wide selection. You can get Mexican, pasta, steak, fish, breakfast, meatloaf, etc. Yes, they use those awful frozen and/or canned vegetables, all the chicken-based soups are that horrible food-service yellow-green color, and the waitresses all call you “hon.” But there’s generally good service and decent food, and since our burg doesn’t really offer much else besides fast food and supper clubs, we usually go there when we’re too lazy to cook.
So anyway, yesterday I notice on the specials board that they’re now offering a “Caesar salad.” Cool! So I order it. The first thing the waitress (not one of our “usuals”) asks is if I want ranch dressing with it. Uh-oh. As Mr. S pointed out later, this should have been my first clue. But I pressed on. “Um, do you have a Caesar dressing for it?” So she calls over to the owner, who’s sitting in the booth behind us, and he tells her that “they have it in the kitchen, it comes out all ready.” Oh, OK. So she puts a cup of ranch dressing in front of me anyway (I have no idea why) and we wait for our meals.
The “Caesar salad” comes.
Well, it had croutons, anyway.
First of all, it was on a HOT plate. Who serves a salad on a hot plate? Second, the lettuce was the usual iceberg, bad enough in itself, but it was also mostly that horrid CORE of the iceberg, the yellow, bitter part, which I despise. Third, it had carrots and red cabbage liberally distributed throughout, in addition to the croutons. Fourth, not only was the dressing most definitely NOT Caesar (my best guess is some sort of creamy Italian), but it was so thickly applied as to be almost soupy and extremely unappetizing. And fifth, no cheese whatsoever. It was, overall, the ugliest salad I had ever seen. I took a few bites and did not touch it again.
Luckily I had also ordered a sandwich, so I didn’t starve.
The waitress brought the bill and asked if I wanted the salad packed to go. I said “No, thank you,” which was met with a blank stare and “What’s the matter, didn’t you like it?” I forget exactly how I phrased my reply, but I said (politely) that this bore very little resemblance to what I considered a Caesar salad. We then closed the conversation with a few friendly comments about the weather (big snowstorm just ending), I left her a 20% tip, and we left.
What say you Dopers? True, this was about the furthest departure from what I consider a “Caesar salad” that I’ve ever seen – sometimes they come with a few carrot slivers on top, or a cuke on the side. But this was over the top!
Am I a Caesar salad snob for wanting just the ingredients I listed above?
