Louis dressing is a

salad dressing A salad dressing is a sauce for salads. Used on virtually all '' leafy salads'', dressings may also be used in making salads of beans (such as three bean salad), noodle or pasta salads and antipasti, and forms of potato salad. Salad dressing ...

based on mayonnaise, to which red chili sauce, minced

green onions "Green Onions" is an instrumental composition recorded in 1962 by Booker T. & the M.G.'s. Described as "one of the most popular instrumental rock and soul songs ever" and as one of "the most popular R&B instrumentals of its era", the tune is a ...

, and minced green chili peppers have been added. It is commonly used as a dressing for salads featuring seafood, such as a crab (

Crab Louis Crab Louie salad, also known as Crab Louis salad or the King of Salads, is a type of salad featuring crab meat. The recipe dates back to the early 1900s and originates on the West Coast of the United States. History The exact origins of the dish ...

, the King of Salads) or shrimp ( Shrimp Louis).History of Salads and Salad Dressings
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Origin

The origin of the dressing is disputed. The Olympic Club in

Seattle Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...

, The Davenport Hotel in

Spokane, Washington Spokane ( ) is the largest city and county seat of Spokane County, Washington, United States. It is in eastern Washington, along the Spokane River, adjacent to the Selkirk Mountains, and west of the Rocky Mountain foothills, south of the Cana ...

, Solari's Restaurant, Bergez-Frank's Old Poodle Dog Restaurant and the

St. Francis Hotel The Westin St. Francis, formerly known as St. Francis Hotel, is a hotel located on Powell and Geary Streets on Union Square, San Francisco, California. The two 12-story south wings of the hotel were built in 1904, and the double-width north wing ...

San Francisco San Francisco (; Spanish for " Saint Francis"), officially the City and County of San Francisco, is the commercial, financial, and cultural center of Northern California. The city proper is the fourth most populous in California and 17th ...

, and the Bohemian in Portland all claim to be the home of the dressing, with the invention in either the 1900s or 1910s. In all cases, the original salad was made with Dungeness crab.Peters, Erica J., ''San Francisco: A Food Biography.'' New York: Rowman & Littlefield, 2013, p. 182. From ''The American Heritage Cookbook'' published 1964: * 1 cup mayonnaise, * 1/4 cup chili sauce, * 2 Tbsp finely diced or grated onion, * 2 Tbsp fresh parsley, chopped fine, * A pinch or two of cayenne, * 1/2 cup heavy cream, whipped The first five ingredients are combined and the whipped cream folded in.

References

External links

History of Salads and Salad DressingsThe Davenport Hotel
{{Portal bar, Food Salad dressings Sauces Mayonnaise