I adore old movies. As a small child, I appalled my mother by watching myriad black-and-white classics on television. She was afraid that this solitary pursuit would keep me from making friends.

By the time I got my Ph.D. in American studies with a specialization in film and television history, she had resigned herself to my cinephilia. She took comfort in the fact that, despite this odd pursuit, I had lots of friends. (Many of them loved old movies as well.)

It’s no wonder that I love a good Cobb salad.

I’m not alone. According to the website TasteAtlas, which highlights international food trends, the Cobb salad is the #1 salad here in the United States.

Much of its appeal stems from its low-carbohydrate collection of tasty ingredients, including two of my favorite foods, blue cheese and bacon. It gains further toothsomeness by incorporating a variety of textures, from soft to crunchy.

To me, the appeal is enhanced by the Cobb salad’s history, which returns me to the topic of old movies.

According to legend — and legend is pretty much all we have — the salad was invented late one night in 1937 (or maybe 1938; accounts vary) at the Brown Derby.

The Brown Derby now exists only in replica form at Walt Disney World in Florida. In its heyday, it was the flagship outpost of a group of restaurants in Los Angeles.

The original restaurant was shaped like a hat; hence its name.

The Brown Derby was located close to film and television studios and was known for its movie-star patrons, whose images lined its walls. Clark Gable supposedly proposed to Carole Lombard in one of its booths.

Fans of vintage TV (another of my passions) will recall the restaurant’s prominence in one of the best known episodes of “I Love Lucy.” In the 1955 half hour titled “L.A. at Last!” heroine Lucy Ricardo visits the Brown Derby and becomes star struck at the sight of William Holden, with predictably madcap results.

The Cobb salad is said to have been invented by the Brown Derby’s owner, Robert Cobb. In search of a snack that evening in 1937, he raided the restaurant’s refrigerator for appealing ingredients and added some bacon snagged from one of the cooks.

He assembled the ingredients, threw together a quick vinaigrette, and shared his nosh with another behind-the scenes Hollywood figure, Sid Grauman.

Grauman was an impresario, the owner/manager of what was and is probably the most famous movie theater in the world, Grauman’s Chinese Theatre.

In the way of such landmarks, the theater is now known as the TCL Chinese Theatre, having been purchased by the Chinese electronics company TCL.

I am entertained by the fact that a former ersatz Chinese site is technically now Chinese, at least in ownership.

Grauman and his investors built the theater in 1927 at a reported cost of $2 million, a princely sum back then and a tidy piece of cash even now. It followed on the success of his Egyptian Theatre down the street. “Exotic” movie palaces were highly popular in the 1920s.

Grauman was famous as a showman. He was known for hosting film premieres at his theaters; the first ever big premiere, of “Robin Hood” with Douglas Fairbanks, took place in 1922 at the Egyptian.

Grauman also pioneered the practice that eventually became the Hollywood Walk of Fame by encouraging film personalities to place their handprints in the pavement outside his theater.

When Grauman tasted Robert Cobb’s impromptu salad, he supposedly liked it so much that he came back to the Brown Derby the next day and ordered a Cobb salad.

The salad has undergone many variations over the years. It was originally served with chopped chives, but since my chives are gone for the season, I omitted them.

It is often now accompanied by blue cheese or ranch dressing. Like Robert Cobb and Sid Grauman, I prefer a vinaigrette. It offers a little tang to counteract the saltiness of the bacon and the creamy sweetness of the blue cheese.

Here is the version I made recently. As I noted earlier, it’s not precisely what Robert Cobb made in 1937. The whole point of his salad, however, was to use tasty ingredients he had on hand. Feel free to follow his lead and change the recipe a bit to suit your own taste … and your own refrigerator.

Even if I weren’t in love with the movies, I would probably still make a Cobb salad at this time of year.

In January, we’re all trying to shake off the indulgence of the holidays and eat a bit more healthily. The Cobb Salad lets us do this without being carried away and depriving ourselves. After all, blue cheese and bacon aren’t precisely diet foods.

The salad is flexible. Halve or double the recipe as needed.

Ingredients:

for the salad:

4 cups lettuce (the traditional Cobb salad mixes different types of lettuce; I kept it simple by using only Romaine)

2 hard-boiled eggs, coarsely chopped or sliced

6 slices cooked bacon, torn into small but not minuscule pieces

1 medium avocado, peeled and sliced cherry tomatoes to taste (lots of these are nice, but I had only a few on hand; still, I used them for color and texture)

1 cooked chicken breast, cut into strips

4 ounces blue cheese, crumbled (this is classically Roquefort, which I adore, but all I had was domestic blue)

for the vinaigrette:

4 tablespoons red wine vinegar

1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard

1 small garlic clove, minced

1/2 teaspoon salt

freshly ground pepper to taste

a splash of water

10 tablespoons olive oil

Instructions:

Assemble the salad first. Place the lettuce in a salad bowl or on a large plate.

Cover it with all the other ingredients, ideally spreading them out so they are all visible individually.

In a jar, combine the vinegar, mustard, garlic, salt, pepper and water. Cover the jar and shake. Gradually add the oil; then shake again. Serve the dressing on the side of the salad, making sure to remind people to remix it before they apply it to their salad.

You will have leftover dressing, which you should store in the refrigerator. Be sure to bring it to room temperature and shake the jar well before serving it again.

Serves 2 to 3.

Tinky Weisblat is an award-winning cookbook author and singer known as the Diva of Deliciousness. Visit her website, TinkyCooks.com.