A Salad Named for Bob

One of our favorite things to eat starting at the beginning of spring, just when you really feel the need to kick the heavy food habit, are Cobb salads.  A meal in themselves, they contain all of the necessary components: veggies, protein, salty, sweet, tart, crunchy, creamy, and color!  The Cobb salad was invented in Hollywood in the 1930's by the owner of the Red Derby restaurant.  His name was Robert Cobb, yes, Bob Cobb!  I love this fact!  The story goes, Bob and a friend got hungry one night after the restaurant closed and began rummaging around in the refrigerator.  He pulled out some lettuce, hard boiled eggs, grilled chicken, tomatoes, chives, cheese and some crisp-cooked bacon.  He tossed all of these odds and ends together with some red wine vinaigrette.  His friend thought it was so delicious that he came in the next day and ordered the "Cobb salad."  It was so good, it landed on the menu.  (sounds like huge garbage-salad success, to me!)

Here's my version of Cobb Salad (this amount served 2 of us for dinner):

2 heads of Romaine, washed and coarsely chopped
4 hard boiled eggs, peeled and chopped
1/4 red onion, sliced thinly
1/4 cup crumbled blue cheese
1 roma tomato, diced
2 ripe avocadoes, sliced
6 slices of crisp-cooked bacon, coarsely chopped
red wine vinaigrette (recipe to follow)

Plate up the lettuce on 2 plates.  Top with half of the remaining ingredients and dress with the vinaigrette.

Red Wine Vinaigrette

This is a really, really easy dressing to make.  When I make it, I don't measure everything out, I just make it to taste.  Here's a version from epicurious.com with all of the measurements:

1/4 c red-wine vinegar
1 T Dijon Mustard
1 t sugar
salt and black pepper, to taste
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil

Whisk the vinegar, mustard, sugar, salt and pepper together in a small bowl.  Whisking constantly, add the oil in a slow, steady stream and continue whisking until thickened.

*I put the first 4 ingredients into my mini food processor and pulse until combined.  Then I add in the olive oil and then blend until thickened.