HAIL CAESAR! (SALAD)

You’re in a fancy restaurant. They’re making Caesar Salad at the table, right in front of you. Visions of chariots racing in an ancient Olympic stadium flash through your mind. The audience of wealthy Romans and Senators cheer wildly. Maybe Cleopatra, Julius Caesar, and Mark Anthony are watching?

Wrong.

Caesar Salad was neither Roman or ancient. It came from . . . Mexico.

Huh?

How did the land of tacos and enchiladas give birth to your favorite salad?

In January, 1920, the 18^th amendment to the U.S Constitution banned the manufacture, transportation, and sale of intoxicating liquors. Prohibition. No booze anywhere in the country. Teetotalers celebrated.

Bootleggers and speakeasies went into high gear. Homeowners became moonshiners. Organized crime smuggled banned booze. Gangs thrived. People like Al Capone (below) became household names.

Wikimedia Commons

And Caesar Cardini saw an opportunity.

Caesar was born in a commune on the shores of Lago Maggiore, Italy. He was one of seven children. Three of them immigrated to America, entering the hotel and restaurant business. In 1919, on the eve of prohibition, Caesar had a great idea. He moved to San Diego, California and opened a restaurant just across the border in Tijuana, Mexico – where alcohol was legal.

Cardini commuted daily to “Caesar’s Place” – his restaurant next to the Hotel Americana.

Locals followed, seeking good food and legal booze (see below).

Wikimedia Commons

The story of Caesar salad’s origin was described by his daughter, Rosa. Not everyone agrees, of course.

On July 4,1924, Caesar had a problem. It was a steamy summer night and too many customers flooded the restaurant, eager to celebrate U.S. Independence Day. Caesar wasn’t prepared for the crowds. He was short on ingredients and overrun with eager diners.

He quickly came up with a novel idea – give diners a show while they waited to be served. Caesar set up his ingredients on a table in the middle of the dining room. Everyone watched. He used what was on hand – crispy, whole romaine lettuce leaves, garlic, croutons, parmesan cheese, olive oil, raw egg yolks, Mexican limes, and Worcestershire sauce.

Sound familiar?

He mixed it together and served what would be known as Caesar’s Salad. It was a finger food – diners scooped up the dressing in perfectly-shaped lettuce leaves. The show and the salad were instant hits.

Word spread.

Hollywood celebrities flocked to Tijuana. Stars like Clark Gable and Jean Harlow showed up. Julia Child, as a young child, was brought there. Mrs. Wallis Warfield Simpson, the famous mistress and wife of the UK’s Edward VIII, brought Caesar salad to Europe (she later married the king who abdicated the throne). By mid-century the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel (and other fancy hotels) included the salad on their menu.

Hail Caesar! (salad).

After the repeal of Prohibition in 1933, Caesar knew his business would slow down. Within three years he was out; Daily Meal wrote “Cardini hightailed out of Mexico . . . and never looked back.”

He moved his family to Los Angeles and opened a few small restaurants and a gourmet food shop. By 1938 Caesar focused on selling his signature dressing. Ten years later he established Cardini Foods with his daughter Rosa. The bottled dressing is still available with a relatively unchanged recipe.

Caesar Salad evolved.

Gourmet Magazine reported in 1948 that Caesar Salad was as much a part of Hollywood as swimming pools. A few years later, the International Society of Epicures called it “the greatest recipe to originate from the Americas in 50 years.”

Creative chefs changed things – instead of scoop-shaped romaine lettuce they used bite-sized pieces. They added anchovies, bacon, shrimp, and chicken. Some chefs during the health-conscious 1970s, used a yogurt-based dressing.

In 2007, according to Guinness World Records, the largest Caesar Salad was prepared by the Tijuana Restaurateurs Chamber of Congress. It took 160 people to make and weighed 7,246 pounds.

Today the Associated Press reports that 35% of U.S. restaurants have Caesar salad on their menus and nearly 43 million bottles of Caesar salad dressing (worth $150 million) are sold yearly. Many major restaurants and chains have their own versions.

As the real Julius Caesar supposedly said (and the salad proved), “I came, I saw, I conquered.”

Enjoy!