A lighter take on the classic Caesar salad recipe with flavorful crunchy crouton bits in each bite, garlicky salty Caesar flavor and a generous amount of grated cheese, over perfectly charred, but still crisp, grilled romaine hearts.

You know how there never seems to be enough croutons on a Caesar salad? This Caesar salad with bread crumbs recipe solves that problem, giving you crunchy and flavorful bits of bread crumb in every single bite. They taste like croutons coated in Caesar salad dressing. With the flavors of classic Caesar salad without a creamy dressing, it’s a light and fresh approach to the classic.

There’s no creamy Caesar salad dressing in this recipe, just a drizzle of olive oil and fresh lemon juice over the grilled romaine. Then it’s tossed or topped with these delicious salad bread crumbs. Getting a little char on the romaine hearts adds so much flavor. I’ve done this in cast iron if a grill isn’t available, but the grill gives the best flavor. You can leave the romaine halved or chop it up to serve. (Chopped is much easier to eat!) Finish off with a generous heap of grated parm or pecorino cheese, and it’s even better.

How do you make grilled romaine?

To make grilled romaine hearts, cut each one in half long ways, and rub them with a little drizzle of olive oil. Then, place on a hot grill cut side down, and cook with lid closed, for about 20-30 seconds. It’s finished when the cut side down is a bit charred. This gives you a great grill flavor on the romaine. It wilts slightly but stays crunchy overall. You can also skip this step. The bread crumbs for Ceasar salad would work great with fresh greens like little gem lettuce, romaine or butter lettuce.

What else can you add the breadcrumbs to?

Vegetables

There’s other ways to serve these than just bread crumbs in salad. I’ve made baked artichokes topped with these bread crumbs, and they’d be great on top of thick slices of zucchini, then roasted. You could even sprinkle them over steamed or roasted broccoli and baby broccoli.

Seafood

You might want to make these bread crumbs for salad, but the anchovy flavor in these would work well with seafood. It would be delicious to bake cod or shrimp topped with these anchovy bread crumbs.

Recipe ‘Caesar Salad Breadcrumbs with Grilled Romaine’

Makes 2 Large or 3-4 small Romaine Halves

Cook Time: 20 minutes

Ingredients

1 large head of romaine (if using bagged romaine hearts, you might want to use one per person since they’re smaller)
1 cup of baked, dried bread crumbs
1 garlic clove (less, or swap for garlic powder if you’re sensitive to garlic)
1 tbsp fresh parsley
1/2-1 tsp anchovy paste (you can leave this out but it won’t have as much classic Caesar salad flavor)
1/8 tsp sea salt, or more to taste
1 tbsp extra virgin olive oil + extra drizzles
Fresh squeezed juice from half a lemon
Generous amounts of shredded parmesan, asiago or pecorino to serve

Directions

You can make the bread crumb mixture a bit earlier so the flavors can blend, but it’s good right before serving too. To start heat an oven to 325F. In a food processed, pulse a few slices of bread of your choice, until they are about the size of small peas. It helps if it’s a bit stale or drier. I used whole wheat pita that I had on hand, but sourdough would be amazing or other wheat bread would work well. It should measure a little more than a cup before you dry them in the oven.
Place bread crumbs on a baking sheet in a thin layer and bake for 5-10 minutes, until dried and slightly golden brown. Set a timer so you don’t forget (like I did, and had to remake).
Once the bread crumbs cool a bit, add them back to the food processor. Add in the garlic, anchovy paste, parsley, salt, 1 tbsp of olive oil and blend until fully mixed. I leave them like this, but you can bake again to cook the garlic if you desire, at 325F for 5ish minutes.
Grill the romaine as described above and allow to cool for a minute or so.
Place the romaine on a plate (or chop it up and put in a big bowl to mix). Drizzle a little olive oil and fresh squeezed lemon on top, mix if chopped.
Top with 1/4-1/2 cup breadcrumb mixture, shredded parmesan, asiago or pecorino generously, mix if chopped.