Blue Cheese Wedge Salad
When dining out, one of the first items on a menu that always catches my eye is a Blue Cheese Wedge Salad. I can’t really enjoy a steak dinner to it’s full potential without a wedge salad as a warm up.
My typical routine is to only eat half of my salad and then ask the waiter if I can please hold on to the rest when my steak arrives because I like the way the two go together so well. A little bite of wedge, a tasty bite of steak, a tangy taste of blue cheese, a juicy cherry tomato…and so it goes. I can even pass on a potato with my steak just as long as I have my Blue Cheese Wedge WITH bacon and tomato of course.
My mom used to make wedge salads quite a bit when I was growing up so it wasn’t a stretch for me to come up with my favorite version of the old classic.
To start, I make a very basic creamy blue cheese dressing but hold back a few crumbles to dress the salad on top at the very end. A nice crisp head of iceberg is key and I actually LIKE iceberg and am really not sure how or why it has such a bad rep – it’s not particularly flavorful on it’s own but it holds up well and stays firm for a very long time. Bacon is essential, and please use REAL bacon…turkey bacon just won’t do on a wedge salad.
Lastly, little cherry tomatoes halved are the perfect finishing touch.
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1/2 cup plus 2 TBSP. blue cheese crumbled
- whole milk (you can also use buttermilk)
- 1/2 tsp. worcestershire
- pinch of kosher salt
- pinch of cracked pepper
- 1 head iceberg lettuce chilled
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes halved
- 8 strips of bacon cooked and diced
- Whisk together the mayo, sour cream, worcestershire sauce, salt and pepper. Fold in 1/2 cup blue cheese. Add just enough milk to thin to the right consistency - not more than a 1-2 tablespoons. Chill while cooking the bacon.
- After cooking the bacon give it a rough chop into 1/2" pieces. Halve the tomatoes, set aside both.
- Hit the lettuce core side down on the counter to remove the core. Cut the lettuce down the center, cut again so that you have 4 quarters.
- Place each quarter on a plate. Spoon dressing over the lettuce, add a few crumbles of blue cheese, top with bacon and tomatoes.
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