At the 100th celebration of Caesar Salad’s invention in Tijuana, we were asked to contribute an inventive Caesar Salad recipe to a commemorative book chef Javier Plascencia was putting together. He and his family are the ones responsible for buying Caesar Cardini’s down-in-the-mouth restaurant when it was just about to close and restoring it—dining room and menus—to its early twentieth century charm. I’ve been there several times—even filmed a segment for Mexico: One Plate at a Time there—and watched the waiters create this special salad tableside. From my notes, I created a recipe for the dressing that’s pretty true to their “original”: I use roasted garlic instead of raw and I use a yolk instead of a 1-minute coddled whole egg. Then I piled that salad on tostadas smeared with a savory white bean puree and topped with white anchovies. A shower of Parmesan, lemon zest and roasted serrano complete these truly delicious tostadas.
INGREDIENTS
- 1 head garlic, cloves broken apart (you’ll need 12 cloves, divided use)
- 2 serrano chiles, stemmed
- 1 1/2 cups cooked white beans with enough cooking liquid to cover, either canned or homemade
- 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons good olive oil (divided use)
- Salt
- 27 white anchovies–the ones with the lightly vinegary taste (divided use)
- 3 tablespoons lemon juice
- 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce
- 1 egg yolk
- About 1/2 cup grated Parmesan cheese
- Fresh black pepper
- 2 heads Little Gem lettuce, sliced crosswise into 1-inch ribbons
- 8 four-inch tostadas
- 1 lemon for its zest (optional)
INSTRUCTIONS
Roast the garlic and chiles. Heat a large 10-inch skillet over medium heat. Lay in the garlic and chiles. Turn everything regularly until blackened in spots and soft—10 to 15 minutes for the garlic, much less for the chile. Cool and peel the garlic. Roughly chop 1 of the roasted chiles; thinly slice the other (I leave the seeds in). Set aside.
Make the bean puree. Drain and reserve the cooking liquid from the white beans, then scrape them into a food processor or blender with 8 cloves of roasted garlic and 2 tablespoons of olive oil. Process until smooth. (If the beans won’t move through the blender blades, add the cooking liquid–a little at a time– until the beans move.) The consistency should be smooth and as thick as mayonnaise; if yours is thicker, stir in a little liquid. Taste and season with salt–this may not be necessary if you’re working with seasoned beans. Scrape into a bowl.
Prepare the Caesar dressing. On your cutting board, roughly chop the remaining 4 cloves of roasted garlic and 3 of the white anchovies. Add the roughly chopped toasted chile and work everything into a rough paste--chop it all together, then use the side of your knife to smear it back and forth until it holds together. There should still be some texture. Scoop the garlic-anchovy mixture into a large bowl and measure in the lemon juice, mustard, Worcestershire and egg yolk. Slowly drizzle in 3/4 cup of olive oil in a thin stream, whisking continuously as you add it, until everything comes together into a light dressing. Lastly, whisk in some Parmesan–I like a couple of tablespoons in the dressing. Taste and season with salt and pepper, usually about a generous ½ teaspoon each.
Dress the greens. Pour half the dressing into a jar, cover and refrigerate for another round of salad. Add the sliced Little Gem leaves to the remaining dressing and toss to coat.
Assemble the tostadas. Spread about 2 tablespoons of the bean puree on each tostada, then top each one with 3 anchovies. Crown with dressed greens, slivers of thinly sliced roasted serrano chile, a shower of Parmesan and, if you like, a little freshly grated lemon zest.
