There are a few variations of this dressing, and many stories as to its origin. The story that is generally accepted in the restaurant world is that Caesar Cardini invented the recipe “on the fly” once when the restaurant was packed and he was out of some ingredients. A quick scan of the pantry gave these ingredients along with the salad base, and then he prepared the salad at tableside for flair. Cardini family legend has it that Caesar did not put in anchovy as he didn’t like them. Supposedly these were added later by a relative. The salad traditionally is made with smaller whole leaves from closer to the center of the head, and the leaves were picked up or cut with knife and fork. I make the dressing without egg yolk because I am lazy. You can also substitute mayonnaise for the egg yolk. Yolk or mayo really do give you a much richer dressing that coats the leaves beautifully, but the flavor is still quite good without them. You will need to use more olive oil to get the right emulsification of the dressing instead.