Summer is here, even if the weather is not really cooperating. And we've been eating a lot of Caesar salads to get in the mood. I make a quick dressing from scratch; it's much more satisfying than something from a bottle, and you can vary the taste from something mild and creamy to something a little more tangy.
I've found the Williams-Sonoma cookbooks to be wonderful resources for classic and basic recipes. The 'Salad' book includes a basic Caesar dressing recipe:
Crush 3 peeled cloves of garlic in the bottom of a bowl with a half teaspoon of salt. Crush 4 anchovy fillets and whisk in 1 teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce, 2 teaspoons red wine vinegar and one half teaspoon freshly ground pepper. While whisking, drizzle in one third cup of olive oil.
I either skip the anchovy altogether, or use anchovy paste. Yes, I do keep some in the fridge for when I'm feeling particularly adventurous! For a classic Caesar one must use only the freshest romaine leaves and very gently roll the dressing along with a raw egg over the leaves and scatter some Parmesan shavings about.
But for a variation from the classic, and to make it more of an everyday dressing, I whisk in a little mayonnaise to turn it into a creamy dressing. Instead of Parmesan it's sometimes nice to put a whole block of feta on top.
Today's salad was far from a classic Caesar; it was more of a Greco-Roman hybrid. The cheese is a sun-dried tomato feta from Vancouver Island. The placement of the feta as you see it in the photo, as a solid brick on top of the salad, was the way we got used to our Greek salads on our trip there a few years ago.
By the way, I tried making croutons with fresh bread, thinking fresh must be better, right? But they did not turn out near as good as some I made last week from slightly stale bread. Is it true that bread has to be a little on the stale side to make good croutons? Or did I just mess them up this time?
Cheers!
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