The Caesar Salad
A Classic That Still Works—When It’s Done Right
There are salads, and then there’s the Caesar.
It’s so familiar we forget how radical it once was: romaine treated like a centerpiece, a dressing built on tension—salt, acid, fat, umami—and the confidence to serve something boldly savory in a world that still expected “salad” to be light, polite, and mostly decorative.
I’ve made hundreds of Caesars tableside over two decades at Hy’s Steakhouse. That experience teaches you something you can’t learn from a recipe card: the Caesar is less a list of ingredients than a sequence of decisions. The dressing must be alive. The romaine must be chilled and dry. The seasoning must be layered. The final bowl must feel inevitable—as if there was never another way it could have turned out.
When it’s done right, a Caesar salad isn’t a starter. It’s a standard.
A Brief Origin Story (and Why It Matters)
The Caesar salad’s origin is famously tied to Caesar Cardini in the early 1920s, most often in Tijuana, where necessity and improvisation shaped its first form. Whether every detail is perfectly documented matters less than what the story represents.
A great classic doesn’t begin with perfection.
It begins with instinct and restraint.
The original Caesar leaned on romaine, olive oil, lemon, egg, Worcestershire, and Parmesan—assembled with confidence and served immediately. Anchovies, debated endlessly since, were either present outright or implied through Worcestershire. Either way, the salad worked because it tasted complete.
Why the Caesar Still Works Today
The Caesar endures because it satisfies multiple cravings at once.
Crunch. Salt. Acid. Fat. Umami. Aroma.
It’s structured like a composed dish, not a side salad. And it pairs effortlessly with everything from steakhouse dinners to seafood, Champagne, martinis, and cold beer. It belongs on menus because it behaves like a classic should—familiar enough to trust, complex enough to respect.
The Myth of the “Simple Caesar”
A Caesar salad looks simple. That’s why it’s so often mishandled.
Most mediocre Caesars fail for predictable reasons:
Romaine that isn’t completely dry
Dressing that leans too hard on one note
Croutons treated as an afterthought
Pre-grated cheese without aroma or texture
But the most common failure is subtler: the loss of sequence.
When ingredients are added out of order, the salad never quite finds its balance. The result is something that tastes assembled, not composed.
Why Tableside Still Sets the Standard
Tableside Caesar service isn’t nostalgia. It’s control.
When made tableside, the salad is built in real time, in the correct order, without shortcuts. Garlic is introduced first, aromatic but restrained. Anchovy follows, dissolving into the base rather than announcing itself. Acid from lemon lifts before richness arrives. Egg provides structure. Oil tightens the emulsion. Cheese seasons. Pepper finishes.
Only then does the romaine enter the bowl—cold, crisp, and completely dry. The leaves are turned, not tossed. Croutons follow last, preserving their texture. Adjustments stop once balance is achieved.
What guests experience as theater is actually discipline.
Tableside service protects the salad from overworking, overdressing, and dilution. It ensures the Caesar reaches the table at the precise moment it’s ready—no earlier, no later.
What Makes a Truly Great Caesar
Years of repetition reveal a few non-negotiables:
Romaine must be crisp, cold, and bone-dry
Garlic should perfume, not punish
Umami must be integrated, not obvious
The dressing should cling, not pour
Parmesan is seasoning, not garnish
Fresh cracked pepper matters more than most realize
Anchovy fillets aren’t about fishiness—they’re about depth. Egg isn’t about richness—it’s about structure. It helps to bind the dressing. Every element exists to support balance.
Variations That Respect the Caesar
The Caesar can evolve, but only within its grammar.
Charred romaine is often cited as a modern variation, but in practice it solves a problem the Caesar doesn’t have. Warm, wilted leaves undermine the very structure that makes the salad work in the first place. Herb-flecked croutons add aroma. Aged cheeses add nuance. These variations work because they reinforce what’s already there.
What doesn’t work are sweet dressings, heavy mayo bases without acid, or random add-ins that blur the profile. Once the salad loses clarity, it stops being Caesar.
Why It Still Belongs on Great Menus
The Caesar survives because it quietly reveals how a restaurant thinks.
A great Caesar suggests:
fundamentals are respected
seasoning is understood
execution matters
restraint exists
A careless Caesar suggests the opposite.
Few dishes function as such an honest diagnostic tool.
The Takeaway
When made with discipline, the Caesar salad isn’t safe.
It’s bold.
It’s salty, bright, and unapologetically savory—built on crisp romaine, a living emulsion, real Parmesan, and restraint.
After twenty years of tableside repetitions, one truth remains:
A Caesar salad doesn’t become great through reinvention.
It becomes great through respect.
