of Rome. Julia Child, on the other hand, had her first Caesar Salad under the eye of Caesar himself, and he wasn't  an Emperor of Rome, he was an Italian restaurateur and hotel keeper in Tijuana, Mexico.  As in most things culinary, Julia had the right answer.

Julia Child was a youngster in the mid 1920's when her parents drove from California to Mexico to see what all the fuss was about Caesar's Salad, and in her book, "From Julia Child's Kitchen,"  (Random House, 1999) this is what she wrote about the tableside performance,

"Caesar himself rolled the big cart up to the table, tossed the romaine in a great wooden bowl, and I wish I could say I remember his every move, but I don't.  The only thing I see again clearly is the eggs.  I can see him break 2 eggs over that romaine and roll them in, the greens going all creamy as the eggs flowed over them."

In the 1920's Caesar Cardini (1896-1956) had a small hotel in Mexico not far from the  California border. The Hollywood crowd and San Diego socialites would drive to Mexico to party in those days of Prohibition, and often they wound up at Caesar's Hotel for a meal before returning home.  The story is told that on the Fourth of July, 1924, people arrived in droves, crowding the restaurant and sending the kitchen into a panic.   There weren't enough fresh vegetables to go around, and in those days Americans weren't wild about salad, but Caesar thought he could make a salad they'd really go for, and he would make it in public -- tableside.  Using ingredients that are basic to every Italian kitchen, he took lettuce (romaine or cos, as pictured above), garlic-flavored olive oil, salt and pepper, lemon juice, parmesan cheese, croutons, a little Worcestershire sauce, and a coddled egg, and he created a salad that looked so good that every table of diners ordered one. Over the years, it became quite the thing to do, to drive to Tijuana for a Caesar Salad.   Clark Gable, Jean Harlow, and W.C. Fields came, and gossip columnists wrote about it in the newspapers.

In 1948 the Cardinis moved to Los Angeles to be closer to their patrons, and when people began bringing bottles for Caesar to fill with his salad dressing, a new cottage industry was born, and Cardini began packaging it for consumers all over the world.  Bearing in mind that the dish originated in Mexico, in 1953 the Society of Epicures in Paris reportedly called the Caesar Salad "the greatest recipe to originate from the Americas in 50 years."

Today many restaurants as well as home chefs add such ingredients as cooked chicken, shrimp or lobster to the salad for a main dish.  However, the most frequent additions to the original recipe are anchovies and vinegar, which were never in the original, although there is a taste of anchovy in the Worcestershire sauce Caesar added.

Authentication from Rosa Cardini, her father's heir to the Cardini Salad Dressing company, comes for the following method of making

1. To prepare the garlic oil, place 4-5 cloves of garlic**, peeled and quartered, in a good quality (e.g. Extra Virgin) olive oil and let it stand at room temperature several hours or even up to 5 days.

2.  To prepare croutons, pre-heat oven to 225 degrees.  Toss bread cubes with 1/4 cup garlic oil and spread on a pan or baking sheet.  Toss frequently and bake until golden brown, about 2 hours.

3.  Wash, dry and crisp (in the refrigerator) the leaves of the romaine lettuce.  Originally, Caesar left the lettuce leaves whole, and the salad was eaten with the fingers, but later he tore the outer leaves into 2-inch lengths, leaving only the small inner leaves whole, and the salad was eaten with a fork.

4.  Place lettuce in a large bowl and toss with remaining 1/2 cup of garlic oil.  Add salt and pepper, again tossing gently.  Break the coddled eggs* over the lettuce, add lemon juice and Worcestershire sauce and toss two or three times.  Add croutons and cheese.  Toss lightly once more.

Serves 4.

PLEASE NOTE
*Over the past few years, the threat of salmonella in barely cooked or coddled eggs has prompted many cooks to use pasteurized eggs or egg substitute or skip the egg entirely and use a heaping tablespoonful of mayonaise to simulate the consistency of the coddled egg.

**Recently a second caveat has arisen-- with regard to possible soil microbes in the garlic.  The suggestion is to blanch or boil cut garlic for a few minutes before inserting it in the olive oil for several hours or several days.
 

Who Cooked That Up? is copyrighted 1998, revised June 2003
by J.J. Schnebel
all rights reserved for your pleasure and enlightenment

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