Caesar salad with chicken

I had no idea, where I should put the recipe of Caesar salad – the creator was an Italian, who moved to the USA and opened restaurants in Mexico and the USA. Let it be international. Also it was created in 1924, so since then there have been created so many variations of Caesar’s salad that it’s hard to count.

This recipe of Caesar salad is relatively classic. The dressing had undergone quite many experiments until I became satisfied. Original version of dressing calls for Dijon mustard and Worcestershire sauce, I don’t know how to consume both of them until their expiry date, so I’ve changed them to more simple and common (at least in the CIS, Europe and the USA) ingredients. Actually these ingredients are what both sauces are made of.

I don’t like anchovies in Caesar’s dressing (I agree with the creator, Caesor Cardini), but if you do like them – add 2 anchovies or 0,5-1 tsp of fish sauce to the dressing. Also adding non-original decorations like little tomatoes or quail eggs depend on your choice / taste.

For vegetarian version (original Caesar salad didn’t contain chicken or shrimps) – add more lettuce. For gluten free Caesar salad – omit croutons. To make this recipe quick, use already cooked (buy them in shop) chicken breast and croutons. According to my recipe you will make 2 portions of Caesar salad or 1 very big portion. 🙂

Ingredients:

• 200-250 g of romaine lettuce (sometimes I replace it with iceberg lettuce)
• 160-180 g of cooked chicken breast fillet, generally I use this recipe (it means 200-225 g of raw chicken breast fillet). If you have bought cooked-smoked chicken breast, then you should reduce the amount of salt in dressing.
• 20 g of parmesan cheese

Caesar’s dressing:

• 1 medium-sized egg
• 60 ml of oil (preferably olive oil, but it can be easily replaced with any other flavorless oil)
• 1 little clove of garlic
• 0,5 tsp of mustard powder
• 0,5 tsp of sugar
• 0,25 tsp of salt
• 0,5 tsp of dry basil leaves
• 1 tsp of dried oregano
• 0,5 tsp of vinegar, 6% (apple vinegar suits the best, raisin/grapes vinegar will be good also)
• 3 tsp of lemon or lime juice (can be replaced with 3 tsp of 6% vinegar)
• 1 tsp of soy sauce
• 0,25 tsp of balsamic vinegar

Croutons:

• 80 g of white bread (please note, that I’ve weighed light-weight airy bread like French baguette). If you want perfect cubes without bread crust, you’ll need ~180 g of white bread
• ~25 ml of flavorless oil

At your wish (I don’t add them):

• 4-8 cherry tomatoes
• 2 boiled quail eggs

Equipment:

• Hand blender with basic blade shaft

You can cook more croutons and chicken fillet to save the time tomorrow: chicken beasts should be stored in a fridge, croutons – in a jar on a table.

Instructions

1. Wash lettuce leaves, shake them well to get rid of water and leave them to dry. If you don’t have cooked chicken breast, use this recipe to cook it.

2. Preheat oven, 210°C, and bring a kettle with water to a boil.

3. Dice the bread. Put bread cubes on a plate and pour oil with thin flow over them, then mix them thoroughly and gently in order to spread all of the oil that is on a plate.

When I cook Caesar salad for me, I don’t cut the crust off the bread. But when I cook it for my guests, I have 2 options:

a) I do separately – cubes with crust and “perfect” cubes without it. Prior baking them, I put cubes with crust to the left of baking sheet and cubes without crust – to the right.

b) I cut off the crust and enjoy eating it f.e. with courgette caviar.

4. Bake croutons. I use convection+grill mode. Time of baking is 4-5 min. You should be watching croutons as they can get burned in several excess seconds.

5. As the water in a kettle was brought to a boil, put the egg in a cup and fill it with boiling water. Cover the cup and leave the egg for 1-3 min. Then take the egg out off the water and leave it to cool down for 10-15 min.

6. Meanwhile slice chicken breast and cut/tear with hands lettuce leaves. Grate cheese (I usually grate it over plates with portions of salad).

7. Put all Caesar’s dressing ingredients to blender glass. Scrape out the rest of egg out of the shell. And put hand blender in the glass so that the blade will be right over the garlic clove. Blend ingredients for 1-2 min. Caesars dressing is ready.

8. One should put dressing to Caesar salad right before consuming. Otherwise croutons will soften and salad leaves will fade. So if you don’t know the exact time, when your guests will start eating Caesar salad, serve the dressing separately.

To make Caesar salad look beautiful, I usually put at first lettuce leaves to a bowl, than I pour dressing and spread cheese.

Then I top the salad with chicken and put croutons next to it. So it will be the guest, who will combine everything with dressing.