Recipe: Cheats Caesar Salad with Leftover Bread Croutons

You’ve heard me wax lyrical about Julia Turshen’s first book Small Victories before. First she taught me how to make the best veggie lasagna (though my meat version is coming soon!), she taught me to put kimchee on my avocado toast, and then from the book I found the steak sauce / relish recipe to trump them all. Now, I’m taking another one of her great kitchen tips to create the only caesar salad recipe you’ll ever need again.

Recently, I’ve been playing around with cooking things that are not chips in my air fryer, which means I’ve been getting through a lot of side salads. To make things more interesting I’ve been working though my list of recipes I want to try looking for interesting dressings, which is what led to my taking 5 minutes out of my day to mix up a jar of Julia’s Caesar. I was practically licking it out of the mini chopper, and I was already plotting making a caesar salad out of it before I’d eaten it for a proper meal, with soft boiled eggs, shaved parmesan, crunchy romaine lettuce and crispy croutons made from the end of the bakery loaf (you know the ones, that go rock solid, perfect to whizz up for breadcrumbs, rather than mouldy after a week on the counter) still in it’s brown paper bag.

Literally the only change I’ve made to Julia’s dressing is to use Japanese Kewpie mayo rather than regular, for a bit of extra tang. Make the whole jar even if you only need a couple of spoonfuls for your salad, as it keeps really well. Use it plain just to dress green leaves, or to make a big salad-as-a-meal like I have done here. Add leftover roast chicken for a more substantial chicken caesar, and anchovies if you’re a massive fan, though I find the amount of anchovy in the dressing enough. Serve soft boiled eggs if you’re making the salad to order but hard boiled will work if you’re making things ahead to serve up as part of a spread.

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Cheats Caesar Salad with Leftover Bread Croutons

• Author: Rachel Phipps
• Prep Time: 10 minutes
• Cook Time: 10 minutes
• Total Time: 20 minutes
• Yield: Serves 1
• Category: Salad
• Cuisine: American

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Description

A super easy caesar salad (with no raw eggs) with a classic tangy dressing, parmesan shavings, soft boiled eggs and croutons made out of leftover stale bread.

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Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

For the Caesar Dressing

• 1 Small Garlic Clove
• 4 Anchovy Fillets
• 1 tbsp Fresh Lemon Juice
• 1 tbsp Red Wine Vinegar
• 60ml (1/4 cup) Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 2 tbsp Kewpie Mayonnaise
• 25g (1/4 cup) Grated Parmesan Cheese
• Freshly Ground Sea Salt & Black Pepper

For the Caesar Salad

• 2 Large Eggs
• Large Handful Stale Bread, cut into 2 cm cubes
• 3 tbsp Extra Virgin Olive Oil
• 1 Romain Lettuce Heart, shredded
• Small Handful Parmesan Shavings
• Freshly Ground Black Pepper

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Instructions

1. First make the dressing by combining the garlic clove, anchovy fillets, lemon juice, red wine vinegar, olive oil and mayonnaise in a mini chopper or blender until smooth. Add the cheese and blitz until combined. Season to taste with salt and pepper.
2. Boil the eggs for 6 minutes before plunging them into cold water to stop them cooking, peeling and quartering them.
3. While the eggs are cooking, make the croutons by heating the oil over a medium heat in a large frying pan until shimmering. Add the stale bread cubes and toss every minute or so until they are crisp and golden. Remove from the heat.
4. To assemble the salad, toss the shredded lettuce with a couple of spoonfuls of dressing until just coated and transfer to a serving bowl. Sprinkle over the parmesan shavings and the croutons, and arrange the eggs. Drizzle with a little more dressing and finish the salad with a good few grinds of black pepper.

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Notes

Store the leftover dressing in a clean jar in the fridge.

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