caesar salad with homemade dressing

Caesar salad has the bad reputation in the salad family. It's not chock full of veggies, and it has a heavy creamy dressing and heaven forbid, loads of croutons. But it's really really good. It's also really really easy to make homemade caesar dressing. (And in a way, also redeem caesar salad's bad rep.)

 dressing: (recipe altered from here)

gather together...
2 tbs of light mayo
6 cloves garlic, mashed + minced
1/2 tsp salt
1 tbs dijon mustard
1 tbs worchester sauce (if you don't want it as tangy, don't include this)
1 tbs white wine vinegar
1/2 cup olive oil
pepper, lemon juice to taste

Combine salt, garlic, mustard, worchester and vinegar in a blender. Add in mayo and blend. (don't overblend! That, apparently, can be bad.) Slowly add olive oil in a stream and blend. Add in pepper and lemon juice to taste.

This will keep for about a week in the fridge.

I paired my dressing with large romaine leaves slightly grilled in a skillet with olive oil, thinly sliced radishes, and whole wheat croutons (I made my own-- recipe here).

Perfect as a meal (the husband and I added chicken to it for dinner) or as as a side.

xo, erika