Lunchbox's Version of the Caesar Salad - Crushed Croutons Make it Delish...
There are a million versions of the Caesar Salad out there. I even saw one with strawberries once - eeek! It was truly alarming. Anyways, we made our own version many years ago and I still love it to pieces.
I prefer having this as a main course as opposed to a side salad so I added some extra oomph to the dressing - we do a buttermilk base that is a bit fattier and complements the tartness of the anchovies, lemon juice, and Worcester. My other improvement seems like a no-brainer but you'd be amazed at how many of us still wrestle with our croutons while enjoying this salad. Read below fro my recipe.
Croutons in a New Light
Croutons are difficult at best; they spin off your fork, evade an easy bite and usually require a fair degree of our attention to wrangle into a salad bite. I also like a bit of crouton with each bite. To that end, I pulse our homemade olive oil croutons a bit in the food processor to crush them unevenly.
Once the salad is dressed they cling nicely onto each and every leaf; it's such a huge improvement on the experience, I cannot stress this enough. I tend to put a little too much Parmesan cheese on my own salad but for purposes of this particular picture managed some restraint.
For the dressing just pour a half cup of buttermilk into your blender, add in the juice of a lemon, a dash of the Worcester, a generous amount of black pepper, some anchovies from the can or a tablespoon from the squeezable tin, and blend up nicely. Add in enough Best Foods mayonnaise until the consistency is fairly thick (you may be adding a good cup). Then taste and adjust your seasoning and you're set. I like to dress the leaves with a good toss, then throw on the crushed croutons and top with the Parmesan and more black pepper.