Binging with Babish: Overnight Salad from SNL

- This episode is sponsored by Makers Mark. I recently teamed up with Maker's Mark to create some cocktails inspired by your favorite TV shows. Head over to her YouTube channel where you can watch the entire "Mixing with Babish" series. The link is in the video description. ♪ And it's not easy to make ♪ ♪ It takes a lot of ingredients ♪ ♪ But it's worth serving my

salad

overnight

. ♪ ♪ Take some lettuce ♪ ♪ Sprinkle on some cheese ♪ ♪ Some lemon whiskey ♪ ♪ And a gallon of mayonnaise ♪ ♪ So many raisins ♪ ♪ An incredible amount of pepper ♪ ♪ Now you're making a

salad

. ♪ Hello guys, welcome back to "Binging with Babish".

For this week I thought the perfect way to close out a year like 2020 was to finally take care of all the requests to make SNL's late night salad. Before we begin, let me remind you that this is what you wanted. With that said, let's get started. I'm going to make a sort of miniaturized version, because I don't want to waste too many ingredients on this. As the song says, "A little lettuce, sprinkle a little cheese, in this case cubed cheddar cheese, add a little lemon whiskey," after all, this is a salad, we need a dressing. And speaking of which, here comes the mayonnaise, not the gallons, but a layer of mayonnaise formidable enough to hold my hot dogs in it.

But as I never thought I'd say, 54 hot dogs seems excessive in the end, I think I used about 25 hot dog halves, then to top it off he says, "So many raisins," I'm going to use two handfuls, and I'm using the Thompson variety of raisins, then an incredible amount of pepper, a perfect application for our pepper canon, and speaking of crazy, we topped it with fritos and root beer, since we were advised not to skimp on either. Once we've filled this to hot dog level with root beer, it's time to add the cracker croutons and pizza dressing, go ahead and fill it up, and she didn't mention it in the song, but the final salad definitely has a extra spoonful of mayonnaise and a maraschino cherry on top.

And there you have it folks, a dish that the moment I saw it on SNL, I swore I would never make and yet it appears here before me. I began to observe the big beast, trying to come up with my best plan of attack, but then I remembered that I had skipped a vital step, leaving it outside

overnight

on the radiator. I don't have a radiator anymore, so this heater will have to work, and that trick will probably give me botulism. So we're going to let this sit overnight and of course, I'm just kidding, this isn't how I want to die, but the law of dishes dictates that I must at least try a bite of this.

So I'm going to do my best to make a bunch of this salad, I want to make sure I can put together a forkful of it with a little bit of everything. We have to dig deep to make sure we get some of that lettuce and cheese, let's try making a bite and see how it tastes. And ladies and gentlemen, I am privileged to be the first to inform you that, like most SNL food fever dreams, this one tastes as good as it looks. So how, in the name of all that is Holy, are we going to make a good version of this?

Well, it turns out that overnight salads actually exist - the idea is that different ingredients are layered and then covered in a thick dressing, preventing the vegetables from wilting and anything from getting too soggy. As you already know, I'll start by making my own mayonnaise. Combine a whole egg, a teaspoon of mustard, a pinch of salt and a squeeze of lemon in the jug of a hand mixer. Then, slowly pour a cup of neutral-flavored oil, such as canola, over the top and blend until a thick, flavorful emulsion, also known as mayonnaise, forms. This will serve as the base for our Russian dressing, because we'll be making an overnight salad inspired by a Reuben sandwich.

So, in a bowl goes our mayonnaise, a third of a cup of hot sauce, three tablespoons of prepared horseradish, a teaspoon of hot sauce of your choice, a teaspoon of Worcestershire sauce, a teaspoon of sweet paprika and a couple of tablespoons of finely chopped sauce. onion. Go ahead and lightly whisk them until smooth, cover and refrigerate for at least an hour, we want this to firm up a bit before topping our salad with it. Instead of cracker croutons, we'll make croutons, and since this is a Reuben salad, we'll use rye bread. Simply cube a bunch of your favorite rye, drizzle generously with olive oil, sprinkle with kosher salt and freshly ground pepper, mix, spread, and bake in a 300-degree Fahrenheit oven, 20 to 40 minutes, until lightly browned. and dry, then it's time to tackle our meat.

Instead of our hot dogs, there's a big piece of deli pastrami, which at first we're going to cut into cubes, but then we'll realize they're not tender enough, so we'll cut them up. into small, fine pieces of pastrami. The last part of the preparation is to shred a bunch of Swiss cheese and with that we are finally ready to assemble. As for the greens, I'm going to go with some chopped red cabbage for color, the arugula will provide a nice spicy bite in contrast to the rich dressing and meaty cheese. Speaking of which, here comes something Swiss, which I'm going to top with chopped pickles, optional, but they'll bring in some nice little salty bites, and I'll top it with a generous but not overwhelming layer of pastrami. a little more cheese, then I'll add more arugula, cabbage and cheese, which should hopefully help insulate our rye croutons from the moisture of the meat.

Let's put them in there and then a final layer of green and purple material. Then we have to protect all these beautiful, crispy layers from the scourge of dressing, which I will do by trying to lightly compress a thick layer of cheese on top, which will hopefully form a seal through which the dressing can't penetrate. . Then we got to dressing, making sure not to rush the Russian dressing. Cover with plastic wrap and then the salad lives up to its name as it is refrigerated overnight. Aside from the ability to get by, I'm not entirely sure why late night salads exist.

So maybe you guys can let me know in the comments. And then, since we're trying all kinds of new things with this salad, I thought we might as well crumble some fries on top. This is totally optional, but it made sense to me because I love putting fries in a Reuben. Everything I learned in life, I learned from Liz Lemon. And obviously for a salad, this is not healthy at all, even without the fries. But it really is very delicious, and it kind of makes up for the eyesore from before, I mean, not really, I think only a sizeable donation to a soup kitchen will do that.

Check out the link in the video description to see where I donated and to donate yourself. Please give what you can and maybe, like with this salad, we can end 2020 on a good note. Speaking of ending things on a nice note, thanks to today's episode sponsor, Maker's Mark. As I mentioned before, I partnered with them to create "Mixing with Babish," a series of cocktails inspired by TV shows. We had a lot of fun making these drinks and filming these episodes, so I hope you have fun watching them. There are nine videos covering everything from a hot toddy to a Bloody Mary.

You can see them all on the Maker's Mark YouTube channel, the link is in the video description. (upbeat music)