Caesar Salad Lettuce Tips Recipe

Since its invention in a Tijuana restaurant about 100 years ago, Caesar salad has been one of the most popular salads in America. This tangy, salty, and cheesy salad is hearty while remaining light and refreshing, and it has plenty of umami-rich notes to round it out. For occasions where you’re serving food at a communal table and the seating is casual, the salad can be a tricky dish to prepare. Serving the salad as stems, as opposed to a bowl of chopped greens, can be easier to eat than a traditional salad that requires a fork. By keeping the root intact, each stem can be lifted by hand and eaten as is.

Recipe developer Taylor Murray loves making this dish for a crowd. “Serving the salad this way always seems to be a hit when I bring it to a barbecue or backyard party,” she says. “The secret is to swap out the croutons for breadcrumbs, which cling to the dressing and don’t need to be pierced with a fork.”

Learn more: 44 Types of Pasta and When to Use Them

Gather the ingredients for the Caesar salad spears

To make Caesar salad wedges, you’ll need whole heads of romaine lettuce with the soft outer leaves, or core, removed. To make homemade Caesar dressing, use a mixture of Dijon mustard, oiled anchovies, fresh garlic, a whole lemon, an egg yolk, Parmesan cheese, and olive oil.

Instead of the more traditional croutons, Caesar salad wedges are best with a crumbly herb breadcrumb topping. This topping has all the crunchy goodness of a crouton, but it’s much easier to eat for this style of salad. This breadcrumb topping is made from a piece of fresh sourdough country bread, olive oil, and chopped dill and parsley.

Step 1: Heat the oven

Preheat oven to 400°F.

Step 2: Cut the bread

Remove the crust from the sourdough bread.

Step 3: Break the bread into pieces

Cut the bread into large pieces and place in the bowl of a food processor.

Step 4: Turn fresh bread into crumbs

Pulse until small crumbs form.

Step 5: Place on a baking sheet

Transfer to a small rimmed baking sheet.

Step 6: Mix with olive oil

Drizzle with 1 ½ tablespoons olive oil and toss.

Step 7: Toast the crumbs

Broil until golden brown, 7 to 8 minutes.

Step 8: Mix with herbs

Allow to cool, then mix with chopped herbs.

Step 9: Pulse the cheese

In the same food processor as the breadcrumbs, pulse the Parmesan until small crumbs form.

Step 10: Add remaining dressing ingredients

Add the mustard, anchovy, egg yolk and garlic clove.

Step 11: Add lemon

Squeeze 1 lemon into the bowl.

Step 12: Mix

Blend until smooth.

Step 13: Slowly add the olive oil

While the motor is running, pour in the remaining olive oil as slowly as possible.

Step 14: Transfer the dressing to a jar

Transfer the dressing to a small jar, thinning with water, if necessary, to create a thin consistency.

Step 15: Dress the salad

Prepare the romaine by removing the thick outer layers, then trimming the root, leaving about ⅛ inch intact. Cut each head of romaine into quarters and transfer the quarters to a plate.

Step 16: Pour the dressing

To assemble the salad, drizzle the romaine with the vinaigrette.

Step 17: Add the cheese and breadcrumbs

Grate extra Parmesan cheese on top, then sprinkle with breadcrumbs.

Step 18: Serve with lemon

Serve with lemon wedges.

Caesar Salad Lettuce Tips Recipe

What can you substitute for raw egg in Caesar dressing?

Egg yolk is the secret to creamy sauces and dressings, where it plays a vital role in emulsification. While it’s generally considered safe to eat raw eggs for most people, some people can’t or won’t enjoy anything made with raw egg yolks. Emulsified sauces, including vinaigrettes, often use egg yolk to help bind the fats in the sauce to the liquids. In the case of Caesar dressing, it gets its signature creamy texture from this little piece of culinary magic, which can’t be exactly replicated without it.

You can still make a Caesar-style dressing by simply omitting the egg. The dressing won’t get creamy and will separate after a minute of resting, but it will still have the same flavor profile as any Caesar dressing. If you want that creaminess but can’t stand the thought of consuming raw eggs, you can use about ¼ cup of mayonnaise to help kick-start your emulsification. Mayonnaise is also an emulsified sauce that uses egg yolk, but those eggs have been pasteurized and the manufacturer has taken care of all the delicate food handling.

Can you make Caesar salad vegetarian?

Caesar salad is often considered a vegetarian salad, and it would be if it weren’t for the sneaky anchovies. Anchovies are known for bringing a deep, complex umami flavor to a dish, and Caesar salad dressing is no exception. While this isn’t a problem for many people, it makes the salad inedible for many people following a strict vegetarian diet. Many vegetarians choose to omit the dried fish from the recipe altogether, and the dressing can be made without them without needing to make any other changes to ingredients or quantities.

If you want to try replacing some of that umami flavor while keeping the salad vegetarian, soy sauce can be a great addition. About a teaspoon of soy sauce can replace up to three anchovies in Caesar dressing, replicating much of the salt and umami that the fish would otherwise provide.

Read the original article on Tasting Table.