Honor the Ruffage

Went to dinner at one of my favorite places tonight, Carlyle Grand in Shirlington. My husband and I once went to this joint every Friday night for about a year or very close to it. They make great salads so I would always start with a Caesar but I'd ask them to use a very light amount of dressing. I wanted them to mix it like they do for everyone else, just when it came time to dip the ladel into the vat of dressing, scoop a much much smaller scoop. Like barely dip the ladel in there. They'd be like, "do you want me to just put it on the side?" And I'd say, "No, I want to have it mixed but just with very little dressing."

After a year or so of fighting this battle--and almost always getting it just right I have to say, as Carlyle service is often impeccable--I finally decided to just swallow my croutons and make it easier on all parties involved [me, my server and most importantly my dining party] and just ask for dressing on the side. So that's how I've been ordering my Caesars at Carlyle for a while now and I've been loving it. I just dip my fork into the ramekin of dressing once and then mix, toss and cut, and it's usually perfect the first time. Might require just a couple more drops. But with each salad I find myself requiring less and less dressing. I just love the crunch of fresh romaine hearts so much.

That's why it angers me to no end when I see something like this put in front of me. Look at the pools of dressing on this salad. Beautiful crunchy earthy lettuce wet with fattening garlicky dressing. Don't get me wrong, I like salad dressing. I like ranch, vinaigrette, parmesan peppercorn... But salad dressing is meant to enhance the delicious natural flavors of the vegetables in a salad not completely mask them. I hate to be THAT customer, and 7 times out of 10 I will just deal with a mistake in my order but forgetting to put my dressing on the side is a dealbreaker for me. I have to be the one in charge of the salad dressing distribution. We snapped this photo and then pushed the salad to the end of the table. The waiter realized the error right away and rectified.

I love the Carlyle and encourage those of you who haven't gone to go. I don't blame them at all; my idiosyncrasies are my own cross to bear.