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Great Caesar's Ghost


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The Washington Post Food Section today has a story on the history of the Caesar salad. According to Julia Child, an unimpeachable source, the original recipe for the dressing contained only 6 ingredients: a coddled egg, olive oil, garlic, lemon, worcestershire sauce and parmesan cheese; no anchovies. As we all know, worcestershire sauce contains anchovies, so adding anchovies seems redundant. Whenever I make a Caesar salad, I use the traditional recipe. I see versions delivered in restaurants that have whole anchovy fillets laced across the top of the salad. Other restaurants meld them into the dressing. Some people use anchovy paste instead of whole fillets. What's the thinking out there on this crucial issue, does the addition of anchovies, in whatever form, add to or detract from the original Caesar salad made with just worcestershire sauce?

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Well, I don't know about vile.  I use the paste in my Caesar, which is based on the recipe in the Zuni Cafe cookbook, although theirs uses the actual anchovies.  Does that whole statement make any sense?

I could see it working in this case. I just find the smell of the stuff very off-putting. But I'll bet it's like fish sauce in that it tastes good when mixed in with other things.

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A few years ago, the Post came up with a Caesar dressing that omitted the undercooked egg and substituted . . .mayonnaise. Really. And, it is very good. No matter how big a batch of it I make for potlucks in my building it ALL gets hoovered up.

However, I don't put anchovies in it. Too many people just don't like 'em. I always forget to chop up some when I make this just for us. Craig and I went through a spell in which we used anchovies in just about everything. We were under the influence of Marcella Hazan at the time and bought the salted ones at Dean & Deluca, which have to be "cleaned." Get him to tell you how he inadvertently guaranteed himself a seat on the Metro. <_<

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However, I don't put anchovies in it.  Too many people just don't like 'em.

But as the article states, everyone likes Caesar dressing. If you use the Worcester or even the paste, as long as you don't go overboard, no one knows it is there. But it wouldn't taste enough like Caesar without it.

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But as the article states, everyone likes Caesar dressing.  If you use the Worcester or even the paste, as long as you don't go overboard, no one knows it is there.  But it wouldn't taste enough like Caesar without it.

Yes it would. See Child's recipe inThe Way to Cook. Just a few drops of Worcestershire sauce.

Yeah, so revoke my foodie creds. I hate anchovies.

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Yes it would.  See Child's recipe inThe Way to Cook.  Just a few drops of Worcestershire sauce.

Yeah, so revoke my foodie creds.  I hate anchovies.

The Worcestershire is the anchovies in this case. Its that little bit of the flavor from somewhere that makes it a Caesar dressing and not a garlic dressing.

Not that a garlic dressing isn't good too.

It's funny - I'm not normally such a strict constructionist. Don't know why I'm so adamant about this one. <_<

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It's funny - I'm not normally such a strict constructionist.  Don't know why I'm so adamant about this one. <_<

Probably because it is really a simple thing, which requires good ingredients. It's the anchovies which seems to cause folk to draw a line in the sand. I believe that quite a few people were turned off the little fishies from eating those truly nasty things on a pizza at a young age. Italians know that anchovies can add a real depth of flavor to an awful lot of foods, as long as they are good quality to begin with and used judiciously. Most of the time, you won't know they are there.

We return to our regularly scheduled program: Caesar Salad--Whither the Anchovy?

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I'm not a big Caesar aficianado, but I love a good salade Nicoise, which REQUIRES anchovies. I love the sharp, almost overpowering saltiness when I get a bite of one, dressed with olive oil and mitigated somewhat by hard-cooked egg or lettuce or even olive .... Perhaps that's what appeals to anchovy lovers in Caesar. However, Caesar is a simpler salad than Nicoise, with fewer ingredients, so I can see a case for "hiding" the effect of the anchovies in the Worcestershire sauce.

Hmm, perhaps I'm adding as little to this debate as a hidden ingredient adds to a salad ... <_<

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Hmm, perhaps I'm adding as little to this debate as a hidden ingredient adds to a salad ...  <_<

Would it surprise you to know that many of what might considered "classic" dishes are often done badly because the essential, but not obvious, ingredient is left out?
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With all due respect to Mrs. Child, and my humble opinion, you can no more make a Caesar Salad without anchovies than you can make a Martini without gin.

...or a beer without rice, right? One may prefer the salad dressing with anchovies (and why not? you like what you like!), but it's no more an authentic Caesar salad than Budweiser can be called an authentic Pilsner from Budvar.

Mrs. Child had extensively researched the topic at one point, and in the end it came down to an conversation she had with Caesar Cardini's daughter, who stated in no uncertain terms that the original recipe did not use anchovies...only Worcestershire sauce.

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. . . which is made from anchovies.  Who came up with Worcestershire sauce, anyway?

Credited to John Lea and William Perrins, who began commercial production 28 August 1837.

While made from whole anchovies, "Worcestershire in various stages of aging sits in 35 6,000 gallon fir vats" for up to two years, according to Poundstone's Big Secrets. Arguably it's closer to garum than to tinned anchovy.

This is all nitpicking about authenticity. There are probably only a handful of people alive today who might have tasted the original salad by Cardini's hands. And as food historians know, it's all guesswork as to how ingredients and methods have subtly changed over the years. Worcestershire might not taste today as it did in the time of the original salad. I personally have nothing against boquerones or anchovies, having been known to partake from time to time...

October 2005, Siena, Italy

post-710-1143694470_thumb.jpg

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There are probably only a handful of people alive today who might have tasted the original salad by Cardini's hands.

Julia and Jacques: Cooking at Home introduces Julia's anchovy-less version by saying that her parents took her to eat a caesar at Cardini's when she was a child and that version is her take on it. (Which is not to say Julia Child is alive; just some trivia for y'all.)

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you can no more make a Caesar Salad without anchovies than you can make a Martini without gin.

I was in Paris a few years ago working on a project with Rocco "The Rock" Siffredi in the middle of one of the city’s perpetual strikes. Thousands (primarily university students) were protesting and rioting over the decision by the French government to require that any anchovies served in France must have come from the St. Anchoves shoals off the Brittany coast to be called "anchovies." This protectionist crackdown was apparently triggered by the flooding of the market with imported Engraulis encrasicolus from the Cantabrian coast of Spain, which by all accounts were superior in taste and texture.

The Rock and I watched from our penthouse duplex in the Tour Montparnasse as Paris burned, and sang "Nearer my Cod to Thee."

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I think there is a pet peeves topic somewhere, but I can't find it....but this is driving me crazy so I'm posting under a new topic, knowing that our wise moderators will move it if need be.

The endless debates about whether a Caesar salad contains anchovies (Cardini's original did not...but he's dead...) will never be resolved, but one thing we know for sure. It is a C-A-E-S-A-R salad. It was Julius C-A-E-S-A-R.

Not Ceasar. Not Cesar.

Right now I am looking at a menu that serves vinagrette, safron, rissotto, zuccini, sontina cheese, avacado, proscuitto, chicken piemontesse...

Though I have to hand it to them. They spelled Caesar correctly!

Sheesh.

Ellen

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