Caesar dressing is a guaranteed crowd-pleaser, whether served drizzled over crisp romaine hearts, as a sauce alongside grilled chicken or in a lunchtime wrap. Making the dressing can present an age-old dilemma, though: to use raw egg yolk or not? In the test kitchen, we recently tested a recipe for carrot vinaigrette that called for a hard-cooked egg. Impressed by the vinaigrette's satiny texture and body, we used the same technique in a Caesar dressing. Ultra-smooth and wonderfully creamy, the result is one superb surprise.
New Classic Caesar Salad
Recipe from the Tasting Table Test Kitchen
Yield: 4 servings
Prep Time: 10 minutes
Cook Time: 11 minutes
Total Time: 21 minutes
Ingredients
1 large egg
¼ cup fresh lemon juice (from 2 lemons)
½ teaspoon Dijon mustard
1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
5 anchovy fillets (optional, but strongly encouraged)
½ small garlic clove, roughly chopped
¼ teaspoon kosher salt, plus extra if needed
¼ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper
½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
2 Romaine lettuce hearts, leaves separated
3 cups homemade or store-bought croutons
Wedge of Parmigiano-Reggiano or other hard cheese, for shaving
Directions
1. Hard-boil the egg: Bring a small saucepan of water to a boil over high heat. Add the egg, reduce the heat to medium-low and simmer for 11 minutes. Turn off the heat and place the cooked egg under cold running water. When the egg has cooled, roll on a hard surface to crack the shell. Peel.
2. Make the dressing: To a blender, add the lemon juice, mustard, Worcestershire sauce, anchovies, garlic, ¼ teaspoon salt, the pepper and the peeled hard-boiled egg. Blend until smooth, about 30 seconds; then, with the blender running, drizzle in the olive oil a little at a time. Taste and add more salt if needed.
3. Place the lettuce leaves on a large platter. Top with the croutons and drizzle with the dressing. Use a vegetable peeler to shave the Parmigiano-Reggiano cheese over the salad. Serve.
