Classic Caesar Salad

Caesar salads are some of my favorites, and whenever I have open access to a salad bar (like here at my university, where this access is dependent on sanitizing my hands before and after, and wearing a mask at all times), they’re one of my favorites to build. The story behind this salad goes back about 100 years and has a number of twists and turns I didn’t know about until very recently—just a few weeks ago.

I had assumed that such a classic dish by that name would have been brought to the United States in the 1800s through one of the waves of mass migration to America from Europe around that time. But it turns out that the salad actually originates much later (in the 1920s or 1930s) and much further southwest (in Mexico) than I had imagined. Apparently, this dish originated around the time of the Great Depression when an Italian-American chef working in Mexico wanted to prepare a salad to feed American expats in Mexico. Until I found this out, I had expected the Caesar salad to have been an old Roman classic, what, with that name and all.

This classic salad, original geography aside, has 3 main components: good Romaine lettuce, croutons, and a dressing. I am notorious in these recipes for doing as much as possible myself, but there has to be a line somewhere. Luckily for you, dear reader, that line is somewhere around “I’m not going to make you grow your own lettuce.” (But on the off-chance that this makes it to Chef Frank Proto—we Epicurious fans would love to see your take on a Level-3 Caesar, Chef!)

Romaine is a head lettuce, and that means it needs to be cleaned a certain way. Chop the lettuce first, and then clean it. Lettuces anatomically similar to Romaine are held together at a single point, so unless you free each leaf from its connection to that central point on the core, dirt and other residues can still accumulate and remain hidden.

As for the dressing, there are two ways of making it—entirely from scratch or by combining a number of premade ingredients. This binary option comes from the fact that Caesar dressing is a mayonnaise-based dressing. You can either make your own mayonnaise according to the method I laid out in the Mother Sauces series, or, if you aren’t comfortable with raw eggs, you can use a high-quality store-bought mayonnaise. Mince or press 3 garlic cloves into ¾ cup mayonnaise (store-bought or homemade) and 1½ tablespoons of Dijon or whole-grain mustard. Juice and zest one lemon into the mayonnaise and mustard. Grate in parmesan to your liking. Season to taste with salt and fresh-cracked black pepper. This is a completed Caesar dressing.

Finally, we have the croutons. Mince 6 cloves of garlic into 6 tablespoons of softened butter. Cut one loaf of sourdough into slices 1½ inches thick. Cover each slice with some of this butter. Then, cut each slice into cubes. Place these buttered cubes in a 300-degree Fahrenheit oven until golden brown, but not burned. Allow the croutons to cool once they come out of the oven. Hot croutons will change the chemistry of the dressing (especially if you made it fresh) and wilt the lettuce. To avoid these problems, only toss the dressing, croutons, and lettuce when everything has cooled to room temperature.

To serve, toss everything together and optionally garnish with extra parmesan.