This classic wedge salad recipe is an easy crowd-pleasing dish that comes together fast and easy! (Jump directly to the recipe.)
I can hear his voice in my head as I plated the iceberg wedge salad and took a look at it. “I’d probably give that plate a B or B+ if I had to judge…” was how he would say it, looking at me as I overloaded the iceberg lettuce with chopped tomatoes, blue cheese chunks, thick bacon bits, shavings of shallots, a sprinkling of chopped parsley, not to mention the healthy dollop of blue cheese dressing. He would probably shake his head a little, and then tell me that I was crowding the plate, putting too much on the salad. He taught a cooking class I took a few months ago at a culinary school and he was pretty critical on people’s plating, something I did appreciate as that’s really the only way you can learn. But as I’ve stated before when I made my bialys, I’m a maximalists when it comes to food. More is often more for me and so I sprinkled the salad with even more bacon and thought to myself, oh well, good thing he’s not around to judge. After all, I’d rather eat something that tastes great but isn’t so picture-perfect than eat three single leaves of lettuce on a plate and want for more.
Wedge salads have always held a soft spot in my heart. Growing up in the Midwest, Iceberg was the default lettuce and though my palate has expanded beyond the watery crunchy green leaves, I still find myself tempted to order it when I see it on a menu. Though it went away for awhile in the 90s (when everyone seemed obsessed with miso glazed cod and wasabi mashed potatoes), it came back with a vengeance a few years ago at fine dining restaurants that decided that wedge salads were the perfect comfort food with a low overhead that they could charge a premium for. Of course, everyone knows you can make it pretty easily at home, but that didn’t stop everyone from ordering them anyway. I mean who doesn’t love a wedge salad?
That said, I do rarely make a wedge salad at home. Usually I’m too distracted by the little gem lettuce or the mixed spring greens at my local grocery store to think about buying Iceberg. But in a recent fit of nostalgia and Midwest American fare (I was making ribs for dinner – recipe to come) I thought ahead enough to buy some Iceberg at the store. My Midwest roots were showing through, but my partner didn’t mind. He’s from Indiana after all. Wedge salad is part of his heritage too.
Wedge Salad
Ingredients
Blue Cheese Dressing
- 1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese
- 1/2 cup mayonnaise
- 2 tablespoons buttermilk
- 2 cloves garlic forced through a press or finely minced
- 1/2 teaspoon smoked paprika
- 2 teaspoon white wine vinegar
- 1/2 cup Greek-style plain yogurt
- salt and pepper to taste
Salad
- 6 slices thick-cut bacon chopped into small bits
- 1 head Iceberg lettuce
- 1 large heirloom tomato chopped
- 1/2 cup crumbled blue cheese
- 1 small shallot thinly sliced
- 2 sprigs parsley leaves chopped, stems discarded (optional)
Instructions
- Make the dressing by placing all the ingredients together in a medium mixing bowl. Using a fork and mix together, mashing the blue cheese into the dressing (inevitably you won’t be able to get all the blue cheese to mix, that’s OK). Season with salt and pepper to taste.
- Cook the bacon until crisp and drain in bowl lined with paper towels. Assemble the salad by cutting the head of lettuce into quarters (wedges) and placing them on a plate. Drizzle with a couple of tablespoons of dressing on the lettuce, reserve leftover dressing for people to add more if they want. Sprinkle the dressed lettuce with the chopped tomatoes, crumbled cheese, shallot slices and bacon bits. Sprinkle a little chopped parsley over the salad and serve immediately.
Notes
If you like this classic wedge salad, check out these other classic salad recipes from around the web:
Recipe Girl’s Classic Cobb Salad
Shutterbean’s Simple Caesar Salad
No Recipe’s Nicoise Salad
Merry Gourmet’s Waldorf Salad
Closet Cooking’s Spinach Salad with Bacon
Emily Shetler says
Love a wedge salad!
Millie | Add A Little says
This looks great and perfect for an easy dinner party! Looks impressive!
Marisa Franca @ All Our Way says
Your salad I would pay good money for and living in Indiana — in the heart of — I don’t usually see a wedge, but I don’t look for it. The first time I had it was in Capri — Florida not Italy. A friend of my husband kept bragging about this restaurant and they were famous for the salad. I looked at my plate and thought ??????? There was this wedge of iceberg salad on my plate with a bottled blue cheese dressing miserly poured on top. I never ordered another one. Now ribs?? we won’t order those out either — my Honey makes THE BEST and we have the best Spicy Bourbon BBQ sauce. Now you’ve got me hungry. We’re pretty much carnivores in this part of the country. I’ll look forward to checking out your ribs. 🙂
Aimee @ Simple Bites says
This is all I want to eat today. Thank goodness for tons of lettuce in the garden!
Adri says
Your salad is beautiful And to the teacher who would have told you the plate was crowded, I say “Crowded, shmowded, pass it over to me.” Oh, but I am so tired of plate critical folks. Gimme the food. Iceberg lettuce was the default lettuce of the fifties. In fact, it was the ONLY lettuce back in the fifties when I was a kid, That was back in the time when bigger was better in cars and a general named Eisenhower was President. You probably learned about him in school. We used to call him “Ike.” Ring a bell?
Irvin says
Ha! I’m older than I look though not old enough to be around when Eisenhower was around. But I absolutely do remember learning about Ike and his I Like Ike campaign in school!
Karen says
Adri- Yes I somewhat remember Eisenhower. We were kids and a school kid used to chant: “Ike in the White House-waiting to be elected-Stevenson in the trash can waiting to be collected”…. haha I remember when he said it that I felt sorry for Stevenson… haha Also I LOVE Wedge Salad and this looks amazing! I’ve seen where some ppl cut and then lightly grill the iceberg, but it does have a lot of water, So I guess a brushing of peanut or oil might be necessary prior to grilling. Makes me want to serve one soon! Cheers to you Adri and your great memories!
jwheelerins@gmail.com says
Eating salad is the best feeling. Eating with those nutritious food gives us a healthy body and mind. Thank for posting. I do really love salad.
Miss Kim @ behgopa says
I feel like I don’t eat enough salad. I gotta change that. I am with you on preferring the taste of something over picture perfect beautiful presentation. Looks delicious and hearty.
Jamielyn@iheartnaptime says
This looks so good right now! Love a good wedge salad! YUM! Pinning!
Kim Beaulieu says
My mom loved wedge salads, which was about the only salad I ever saw growing up. We never ate them, it was so odd now that I look back on it. But my mom loved this one and would make it for herself for lunch quite often. My daughter loves iceberg lettuce, like eat the whole head of lettuce in one sitting kind of love. There’s just something about it the reels her in. I have to admit I dig it too, so apparently it’s something passed down through the generations.
merri says
LOL i am the person from your ‘who doesn’t love wedge salad.’ We did use iceberg growing up and i never knew there was another type of lettuce til I was older, but I also never came across a wedge salad til i was a grown up so that’s probably why i don’t like it. it confuses me.
LyndaS says
That is one BEAUTIFUL salad!