We Give This Homemade Cobb Salad, an Eleven Out of Ten Stars.
Crispy, panko-crusted chicken, crumbled bacon, creamy avocado, perfect six-minute eggs and sharp blue cheese lay together atop a bed of crunchy romaine and then—because you’re JUST THAT GOOD—you pour homemade buttermilk dressing over the whole beautiful mess. And that’s the moment, the day, the hour that you’ll never forget—the one when your family began to beg to have salad for dinner.
Who Invented the Cobb Salad?
Cobb salad origin stories abound, but we can say with relative certainty that this classic American composed salad was first eaten at L.A.’s infamous (and now defunct) Brown Derby restaurant in the late 1930s. Named for the Derby’s owner, Robert H. Cobb, the salad was supposedly created one night when he (or perhaps the chef—tellings vary!) stumbled into the kitchen late one night and made a meal out of leftovers he found in the fridge. And hence, the Cobb salad was born.
What’s in a Cobb Salad?
So, what exactly were these leftovers and why is the salad they made so very, very good? Here’s what goes into our classic Cobb salad recipe:
- Chicken. Our Cobb salad recipe features crispy, panko-crusted chicken. Because crispy and fried is always better than not crispy and not fried.
- Avocado. I mean, this salad was born in California. Of course it has avocado.
- Bacon! You can pan-fry it or bake it in the oven, just be sure it’s nice and crisp.
- Blue cheese crumbles. Roquefort is the classic blue cheese for Cobb salad—we love its rich tangy punch and perfect crumble.
- Hard-boiled egg. We like ours with a nice jammy yolk. You can see our instructions for how to make perfect six-minute eggs.
- Dressing. Here’s where our Cobb salad recipe differs from the classic—and is (dare we say?) better! Instead of the classic Brown Derby dressing (a super tangy, Worcestershire-y vinaigrette) we think the best dressing for Cobb salad is a creamy, herby, homemade buttermilk ranch.
- Romaine! Not only is it one of the healthiest lettuces out there (totally counteracts all the bacon and cheese, right?) it’s sturdy enough to hold up against ALL of the Cobb salad ingredients that we pile onto it.
How Do You Make a Cobb Salad?
Composed salads like this sound like such a fancy, restaurant-y thing but really all you do is assemble a bunch of ingredients on a plate and serve. Here’s how to make our best ever, perfect Cobb salad:
- Fry the chicken. This is the most work our Cobb salad recipe requires of you. Well, frying the chicken and then managing to not eat all of it before you have a chance to assemble the salad.
- Boil eggs. As we mentioned above, this takes six minutes. Do it while you fry the chicken! Maybe the bacon’s in the oven during all of this stove top excitement, too. You brilliant multi-tasker, you.
- Chop, dice, slice. The avocado, the bacon, the egg, scallions, cherry tomatoes, romaine, all of it.
- Assemble on a big platter! In whatever arrangement makes it look pretty to you! Or don’t. You can also just dig right in, or lay out the various toppings and let everyone assemble their own version of the Cobb salad.
Panko-Fried, Crispy Chicken = Cobb Salad Perfection.
Most classic Cobb salad recipes call for simply broiled or grilled chicken breasts, but we’re taking this Cobb salad to the nth degree by serving it with panko-crusted, crispy fried chicken instead. You can certainly use some leftover grilled or poached chicken breast if that’s what you have on hand—after all, this salad was created as a way to gobble up leftovers! But, if you’ve got a few extra minutes, our crispy chicken Cobb upgrade is SO worth it.
Tools You’ll Need:
Salad Season at its Finest!
Other main-dish salads we’ll be living on this summer:
- This heart healthy kale Caesar salad.
- Our rainbow-hued, heart-friendly salmon Niçoise salad.
- And we can pretty much always get excited about this retro-fun Chicken Waldorf Salad.
Was It the Best Cobb Salad Ever?
Or what? Tell us how your Cobb salad turned out, we really want to know! Snap a photo, and maybe even a video of the beautiful people you feed it to. Tag us on Instagram using @themodernproper and #themodernproper. Happy eating!
