Shrimp Caesar Salad

Tuesday 30 April

We all know that there's not much to Caesar salad beside salt and crunch.  Some claim that the Tijuanan original had languid diners dipping whole romaine leaves into the piquant dressing.  But we need protein, and we don't need salmonella (viz. raw egg).  So the only thing ours has in common with the original is romaine.

We tore our lettuce up, and tossed in a chiffonade of about ten sorrel leaves, and three diced Roma tomatoes, for variety's sake.

The dressing started with two big cloves of garlic, mashed with salt.  They got beaten into the juice of 1 1/2 lemons, around three Tablespoons of Worcestershire, and enough olive oil to make it come together as an emulsion.

For protein, we dried off half a pound of raw shrimp, sprinkled them with a mix of salt, white pepper, cayenne, and quickly pan-fried them.  They got put on the bottom of plate to absorb the dressing, which is why you can't see them here.

What you can see is our take on the Caesar's croutons and anchovies.  We took some stale white bread, toasted and rubbed with a garlic clove, droozled with olive oil, baked for 3 mins at 350º, and cut into what the Brits call soldiers, topped with the white anchovy fillets we now get at Dean's.

Tossed the salad with dressing, then grated parmesan, piled it on top of the shrimp, and topped with the anchovy toasts.  It sure beats the traditional Caesar.