Hi and a huge welcome to Steve's kitchen. Today we're going to make a delicious
chicken Caesar salad probably one of my all-time favorite dishes and this one is
for the students out there that haven't got a lot of appliances. We've only got a
two-ring hot plate here and a few bits and pieces it's not difficult to make.
I'm going to start by frying up some beautiful chicken filets, now you can
use chicken breast or thigh but you do want to season it and only season it
just before we're going to fry it.So I'm putting a little bit of salt on the chicken filet
I've only got white pepper so I'm also going to pop a little bit of white
pepper on there but you could use black pepper. Now in a frying pan just a little
bit of oil not too much, we'll just coat that over the pan and then on a moderate
to high heat we're just going to take those pieces of chicken, the seasoned
side down, into the pan and then I'm just going to take a little extra salt and
salt the back of the chicken and a little bit of my white pepper. Now I want
to get a little color on this chicken but not overcook it so I'm now going to
lift it out of the pan and pop it onto a plate. We're going to
make some delicious croutons just a little bit of leftover bread and what
we're going to do is just cut this bread up into small cubes. So I'll get a few
slices and then I'm cutting these up so we've got some nice cubes of bread, so
I've ended up with about a cup to a cup and a half of these beautiful little
bread cubes. Now you can choose olive oil really goes well with croutons I've got
a lot of sesame oil with me so I'm just going to drizzle a little of this sesame
oil over the croutons. Get my hands in there, give it a little
coat through. Again a little bit of salt for seasoning I've got some mixed dried
Italian herbs, I'm going to pop those in with the croutons as well and then we
want to take these over to the stove. Now I'm using that same pan that we cook the
chicken in because it's got all that beautiful flavor in the bottom. I'm going
to add maybe a tablespoon of regular cooking oil, you could use any oil you
like I'm going to pop those croutons into the pan on a moderate to high heat
and we are just going to toast off these little bits of bread until they're
lovely and crispy. Now it shouldn't take too long if you
keep turning these over you're going to get these beautiful crisp croutons with
all that lovely flavor inside and they've absorbed all the flavor of the
chicken as well, I'm just going to pop them into a bowl, actually I'm going to
try one first, beautiful. Next the sorcery begins and when I say sorcery I
mean we're going to make our own sauce and if there's one thing I urge students
to try and do is understand the alchemy of making great sauces, it's very simple.
A lot of simple sauces are just an emulsification of oil and this sauce is
no different .We're going to use the egg yolk as the emulsifier whoop's that one
just started to break, pop it in the bowl, take the second one just separate out
that egg yolk. Now I'm going to be using anchovies and the anchovies have a
lovely oil in this I'm just going to take probably about a tablespoon of the
oil from the anchovies and then I want to take a couple of filets of
anchovies out, we're just going to finely slice up these anchovy filets. I've got
a small clove of garlic, not too much I'm just going to crush that down, sprinkle a
little rock salt on to the garlic, then I'll use the coarseness of the salt just
to turn that garlic into a nice paste. We're just going to take the garlic and
the anchovies add them in with my yolk and oil and then I'm just going to whisk
together and those egg yolks are going to emulsify that little bit of oil
that's in there. Now if you like it a teaspoon of Dijon mustard and I do like
it I'm just going to nip the end off a lemon here, now I'm using the acidity
from the lemon about a teaspoon maybe a teaspoon and a half, you could use a
cider vinegar, works just as well. Now we're very nearly there actually I'm
just going to add a little bit of white pepper in with that as well. Now
ordinarily when the sauce is like this what we would do to thicken this is add
more oil into it and whisk it with an electric beater adding about half a cup
of oil gently as you whisk, it's amazing it really multiplies and thickens this
sauce but it also is a high calorie sauce and I'm going for something a
little bit lighter today because I want to be a little bit healthier. So what I'm
going to do is add in 3 tablespoons of a beautiful thick Greek yogurt
I'm also going to grate into there probably about quarter of a cup of
Parmesan cheese and then we're going to beat this together to get a beautiful
thick sauce or dressing. At this point we want to taste the sauce and decide if
you want any more lemon juice in there any more seasoning at all, this is
tasting pretty good actually so I'm going to leave it there and get on and
assemble the salad. Now we're using a romaine lettuce, it's quite often the
traditional lettuce used but any lettuce will do, if you go for the heart of the
lettuce tends it to be a little sweeter and crisper. What I'm going to be doing is
slicing this lettuce up we want sort of strips of lettuce, we're going to take
that lettuce and drop it into a bowl and we've got our Caesar dressing that we
just made with that parmesan I'm actually going to pour some of that on
there, don't have to be too heavy on the dressing this will last for two or three
days in the fridge and then what I want to do is coat the lettuce over with this
beautiful Caesar dressing. Now generally I like to serve a Caesar salad in a bowl
but I haven't got a nice bowl with me so we've got a nice flat white plate here
I'm going to take that salad and just lay it down on the plate remember those
beautiful crispy croutons I'm just going to take a few of them scatter them over
the lettuce. Now our pieces of chicken I'm actually just going to break this up
a little bit and pop it over the top of the salad I'll probably take maybe three or
four pieces of chicken because I don't want to skimp on the chicken. Now I'm
going to grate on some more parmigiano or Parmesan cheese over the top, a few
more of those beautiful crispy croutons. Now just drizzle over some Caesar sauce
dressing I've also added some cherry tomatoes in there mainly for photographs
What I've made today will easily serve two people with lots and lots of chicken
Just come in and take a look at this I'm going to take some of that beautiful
chicken one or two of those gorgeous crunchy croutons, here we go this will be
a cacophony of different flavors I'm really looking forward to this I am
starving.
Oh yum yum. the sauce really makes it, the chicken
makes it, the croutons make it, the salad makes it, this is such a good dish to have
and even if you are in a student pad you can make something like this. It's
delicious, its nutritious, you won't regret it
Now this Sunday we're going to make something sweet so look forward to that
recipe, I haven't quite decided what we're doing yet so tune in and see on
Sunday. Be good and as always if you've enjoyed this recipe share it across to
your friends and particularly students on social media and I will see you in
the next video, take care, be good.