Old-Fashioned Wedge Salad
The wedge salad has been mocked for years as the lazy option on a steakhouse menu, which is unfair to a dish that is very hard to do well and very easy to do badly. There is nowhere to hide. Four ingredients, no cooking to speak of, and every one of them has to be right — which is exactly why it belongs in an old-fashioned kitchen, where the standard was always about handling rather than complexity.
Iceberg is not a lesser lettuce here, it is the only one that works. Its whole virtue is structure: it holds a heavy dressing without collapsing and it stays genuinely cold and crunchy on the plate. Any leaf lettuce wilts under blue cheese dressing within about a minute, which is why substituting romaine to be fancy produces something worse.
And the dressing must be made. Bottled blue cheese dressing is thin, sweet and smooth, and this salad needs it thick enough to sit on the wedge rather than run off, with actual lumps of cheese in it. It takes five minutes and a fork. That is the entire recipe, really — the rest is chopping.
Old-Fashioned Wedge Salad
A quarter of ice-cold iceberg under a thick blue cheese dressing, bacon and tomatoes — the steakhouse classic that lives or dies on how cold the lettuce is.
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Ingredients
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- FOR THE BLUE CHEESE DRESSING
- 1 ¼ cups (170 g) blue cheese, crumbled, divided
- ½ cup (120 g) sour cream
- ½ cup (100 g) mayonnaise
- ¼ cup (60 ml) buttermilk, plus more to loosen
- 15 ml lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
- Salt and plenty of black pepper, to taste
- FOR THE SALAD
- 1 large head iceberg lettuce, very cold
- ½ lb (250 g) bacon
- 1 ⅓ cups (200 g) cherry tomatoes, halved
- 3 scallions, thinly sliced
- ¼ cup (15 g) chives, snipped
Method
- Chill the lettuce. Put the whole head of iceberg in the refrigerator for at least an hour before you start, and longer is better. A wedge salad is a temperature dish as much as a flavor one, and room-temperature lettuce makes the whole plate taste flat and slightly slimy under the dressing.
- Make the dressing. Mash about two thirds of the blue cheese into the sour cream with a fork until it is a rough paste, then stir in the mayonnaise, buttermilk, lemon juice and Worcestershire. Fold the remaining cheese through at the end so there are still recognizable lumps. Season hard with black pepper and go carefully on the salt, since blue cheese is already salty.
- Let it sit. Cover the dressing and refrigerate it for at least 30 minutes, and up to three days. It thickens as it stands and the flavor settles from sharp to properly savory. If it sets too stiff, slacken it with buttermilk a teaspoon at a time until it falls thickly off a spoon.
- Cook the bacon crisp. Lay the bacon in a cold skillet and bring it up to medium heat, turning occasionally, until it is properly crisp — about 10 minutes. Starting cold renders the fat gradually instead of seizing the meat, which is what gives you flat, evenly crisp bacon rather than curled and chewy. Drain on paper and chop coarsely.
- Cut the wedges. Peel off any bruised outer leaves, then cut the head into quarters straight through the core. Leave the core in — it is what holds each wedge together on the plate. Pat the cut faces dry with paper towel, because surface water thins the dressing where it lands.
- Dress and finish. Set each wedge cut-side up, spoon the dressing generously over the top and let it fall into the layers. Scatter over the bacon, tomatoes, scallions and chives, then finish with a heavy grind of black pepper. Serve immediately, while the lettuce is still cold enough to crack when you cut it.
Dress it at the table, not in the kitchen. A wedge that sits under dressing for even five minutes starts to weep, and the water it releases turns the bottom of the plate into a puddle.
Tips for a proper steakhouse wedge
Cold, colder, coldest
Chill the lettuce for an hour and the plates too if you have room. This is the single biggest difference between a homemade wedge and a steakhouse one — restaurants keep the iceberg on ice, and the shock of properly cold crisp lettuce against rich dressing is the whole appeal.
Buttermilk, not milk
Buttermilk gives the dressing its tang and the body to sit on the wedge. Plain milk thins it out and leaves it tasting flat and mayonnaise-heavy. If you have none, stir a teaspoon of lemon juice into milk and leave it five minutes.
Leave the core in
It looks like something to trim off, but the core is what stops the wedge falling into a pile of leaves when the dressing hits it. Cut through it, do not around it, and each quarter stays a wedge all the way to the last bite.
Questions, answered
What lettuce is used for a wedge salad?
Iceberg, and it is not a compromise. Its dense structure holds a thick dressing without wilting and it stays genuinely cold and crisp on the plate. Romaine or leaf lettuces collapse under blue cheese dressing within a minute or two.
How do you keep a wedge salad from getting soggy?
Chill the lettuce thoroughly, pat the cut faces dry before dressing, and dress it at the last possible moment — ideally at the table. Most sogginess is water the lettuce releases as it warms, so temperature does more than technique here.
Can you make wedge salad dressing ahead?
Yes, and it is better for it. The dressing keeps for up to three days in the refrigerator and thickens as it stands, so make it at least 30 minutes ahead. Loosen it with a little buttermilk if it sets too stiff.
What can you use instead of blue cheese?
Feta gives a similar salty crumble with less of the barnyard edge, and a thick homemade ranch works if blue cheese is unwelcome at the table. Neither is traditional, but both hold up on iceberg, which is the requirement that actually matters.
What do you serve with a wedge salad?
It is the classic partner to a steak, which is where it earned its reputation, and it works just as well beside anything grilled or roasted. It is rich enough that it wants a plain main course rather than a saucy one.