I make a rattling good Caesar. I’m not often one to brag, however at any time when I carry out a bowl filled with perky romaine, garlicky croutons, and wisps of Parmesan at a cocktail party, somebody, almost with out fail, will ask for the recipe. And I don’t suppose my visitors are simply being good.
It’s no secret that the dressing is what differentiates Caesar from a terrific one. Many standard recipes insist that the one and solely path to a correct Caesar requires dutifully whisking oil, drop by drop, into smashed anchovies and uncooked egg yolks till the dressing emulsifies. To me, making dressing this manner is anxiety-inducing, to not point out bodily taxing. However I can inform you from expertise that it doesn’t should be this manner. The key to my salad — and to avoiding pointless and finicky bodily labor — is Julia Turshen’s Caesar salad recipe. That, and an Italian fish sauce with roots in historic Rome.
Turshen’s aptly named recipe, Julia’s Caesar, comes from her 2017 cookbook Small Victories. Its ingredient record is simple — garlic, olive oil, lemon, crimson wine vinegar, anchovies — apart from one factor: Turshen has you utilize store-bought mayonnaise as an alternative of whisking aioli. It’s a small however impactful transfer, a shortcut that’s the distinction between whipping up a Caesar dressing in lower than 5 minutes and… not. Turshen’s recipe yields the best Caesar dressing: creamy and tart, with a bit of physique from grated Parmesan thrown in on the finish. You really don’t want to vary a factor.
However final yr, Turshen revealed an replace to the recipe in her newest cookbook, What Goes With What. The revised recipe addresses two minor points I had with the unique: first, it yields extra salad (belief me, you’ll need additional), and second, it incorporates a complete tin of anchovies as an alternative of the few initially referred to as for. However for me, the latter change wasn’t essentially an enchancment: for those who’ve ever tried to switch a small college of filets right into a storage container with out spilling their oil, you understand it may be tough, and regardless of the tinned fish revolution, many individuals are nonetheless squeamish in regards to the small, salty fish. However a Caesar isn’t a Caesar with out them.
So I took a web page from Turshen herself and streamlined the recipe additional with the assistance of Nettuno’s Colatura di Alici, which spares me from ever needing to crack open an anchovy tin.
Colatura is a fermented Italian fish sauce whose origins could be traced again to Historical Rome. The amber liquid has turn out to be extra standard within the U.S. due to specialty groceries like Gustiamo and Zingerman’s and a cadre of cooks who shout it out on their menus, however it nonetheless stays a comparatively under-the-radar ingredient. Composed of the leftover liquid from barrel-aged salted anchovies, it’s splendidly briny, savory and complicated. It’s completely different from fish sauces you’d sometimes get at an Asian grocery retailer; I discover it extra mellow and savory than salty. While you crack open a bottle, it smells undeniably fishy, however as quickly because it’s integrated, the fishiness fades into the background and imparts a deep, savory richness. Briefly, it’s good for a Caesar. As a substitute of opening a tin of anchovies, smashing them right into a paste in your slicing board or pulverizing them in a meals processor, you’ll be able to simply pour a bit of colatura proper into your dressing. No muss, no fuss. Only a salty, wealthy, complicated Caesar salad in your house.
In case you’d prefer to strive my variation, observe Turshen’s recipe exactly, however change the anchovies with a tablespoon of colatura. The sauce is pungent, so begin small after which modify to style. Let or not it’s recognized: Caesars aren’t the one dish the place colatura shines; there’s hardly a dish it doesn’t enhance. It provides depth and richness to in any other case humdrum soups and stews, enhances something with tomato, and offers a kick to uncooked and roasted veggies. Consider it as your new secret weapon — straight from the Amalfi coast.
