Happy St. Patrick’s day! And happy birthday to my dad! He would have been 66 this year. As many of you know, my dad passed away about two months ago after a relatively short battle with cancer. I miss him so much. I was very lucky to have him for a dad for the amount of time I did. In order to celebrate his birthday and St. Patty’s day, my fabulous friend and wonderful cook Cristopher Wobbin hosted a little shindig at her house. She is on the left, Katie is in the middle, and Cortnay is on the right.
She made these fantastically good pizzas. Here is the fig, pistachio and goat cheese. This was my favorite. So creative.
Also, a blue cheese, fresh mozzarella, beef filet and onion pizza. Holy lord.
Everyone ate a lot. In fact, I ate way too much and almost had to be carried home by Jav.
Michelle brought her cute little puppy Charlie.
Maverick got scared with Crissie’s huge chocolate lab Gus and Charlie running around, so he got on the table.
He then needed a Guinness to recover.
My contribution to the meal was my dad’s favorite meal ever. The Caesar salad. Everywhere we went, no matter the restaurant, he would order a Caesar salad. He judged every restaurant by the quality of their dressing and usually ordered an extra side of dressing. It was also the first thing I learned to make at my dad’s restaurant when I was 15. I was also in charge of cooking the chicken on the grill and served many raw in the middle chicken breasts. I am not kidding. My dad was always so complimentary of my cooking and really enjoyed my Caesar, which is fairly lemony. I hope you enjoy it too!
The secret is the homemade garlic croutons. Store bought croutons suck. You can quote me on that. If you do one thing while making salad, please don’t ever buy store bought croutons. They taste like cardboard bits of toasted cardboard. Homemade croutons are very quick and inexpensive to make and keep well in a sealed container. Thank you for your cooperation in advance of this matter.
Caesar Salad with Homemade Garlic Croutons
Printable recipe here
Salad and Dressing
1 Head of Romaine Lettuce washed and torn into bite size pieces
Croutons (recipe below)
2 Cloves Garlic
2 Tablespoons Mayo (I use this in place of a raw egg)
½ Teaspoon Dijon Mustard
3 Tablespoons Fresh Lemon Juice
1 Teaspoon Worcestershire Sauce
1 Teaspoon Anchovy Paste (this won’t make it fishy. At least I don’t think it does.)
5 Tablespoons Olive Oil
¼ Cup Freshly Grated Parmesan plus another ¼ cup for top of salad.
Salt and Pepper to taste
In a food processor grind up garlic, mayo, dijon, lemon juice, Worcestershire and anchovy paste.
Slowly drizzle and mix in olive oil. Turn off processor and stir in ¼ cup parmesan.
Salt and pepper to taste, but it won’t need much due to the cheese and anchovy paste. Pour a little over romaine and mix up with croutons and extra parmesan. Taste for flavor and if needed add more dressing. You can always add more, but you can’t remove dressing. Made this mistake a few times 
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Croutons
1 Loaf of Fresh Sourdough bread chopped into small crouton sized cubes. (I like sourdough, but you can use any kind you want.)
¼ Cup Olive Oil
2 Cloves Garlic Crushed
Lawry’s Seasoning Salt to taste
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Mix olive oil, garlic and seasoning salt together in a small bowl. Put 1/3 of the bread cubes in a large bowl and pour 1/3 of oil mixture over the bread. Mix well. Continue this process until all the oil and bread cubes are used. Add to a cookie or baking sheet and bake for 15-20 minutes until hard and toasty brown. Watch carefully or you might burn.
Love,
Lindzee
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