#73 - Caesar Salad

We made those delicious pizzelle, and we needed to have something else to go with them. Caesar salad sounded like a perfect accompaniment.

Caesar Salad

From Alton Brown This Caesar salad recipe covers everything - the croutons, the dressing, and putting it all together. You wouldn't expect any less from crazy Alton Brown. So you start out by making the croutons, which is something we've never done before. For these croutons, you cut up some bread, toast it in the oven, and then toss with a garlic-infused olive oil over the stove. Then there's a bunch of steps to make the salad dressing, but we didn't take too many pictures of that process. So if you try to make this yourself, you're going about it just as blind as we did. Mmm mmm mmm. This was a delicious Caesar salad. And to think, we made it ourselves! That's super exciting in and of itself.

The salad dressing is a little different than most Caesars that we're used to but it was really good, and the lemon juice added a little fresh kick to it. And the homemade croutons are awesome. And not just because we get to say we made homemade croutons. They're pretty tasty, and we had to keep ourselves from popping too many back before we finished making the salad. If you're looking for a good homemade salad, look no further:

Ingredients

• 1 loaf day-old Italian bread
• 3 cloves garlic, mashed
• 9 Tbs olive oil
• 1/4 tsp plus 1 pinch kosher salt
• 2 eggs
• 2 heads romaine lettuce, inner leaves only
• 7 grinds black pepper
• 1 lemon, juiced
• 6 drops Worcestershire sauce
• 1/4 cup grated parmigiano

Preparation

1. Preheat oven to 350.
2. Cut 1/2-inch croutons from the loaf of bread and place on a baking sheet.
3. Put in the oven until dry but not browned.
4. Using a mortar and pestle, mash the garlic with 4 Tbs of olive oil and 1/4 tsp salt.
5. Strain the oil into a large skillet and heat over medium heat.
6. Add the dried croutons and fry, tossing constantly until all of the oil is absorbed and the croutons are golden.
7. Remove from heat and set aside.
8. In a small saucepan, bring 2 cups of water to a boil.
9. Add the eggs and cook for 1 minute.
10. Remove from water and chill in ice water to halt cooking.
11. In a very large bowl, tear lettuce and toss with 3 Tbs of olive oil.
12. Sprinkle with remaining kosher salt and the black pepper.
13. Add the remaining olive oil and toss well.
14. Add the lemon juice and Worcestershire sauce.
15. Break in the eggs and toss until a creamy dressing forms.
16. Toss in parmigiano and serve with croutons.