 But in 1924, the Caesar salad was born at a popular Italian restaurant in Tijuana, Mexico. This is an Italian salad. Culinary historian Jeffrey Pilcher studies Mexican foodways. In 1924, he says, Tijuana was a bustling border town, popular with tourists during Prohibition. Mobsters and movie stars flocked to Tijuana's bullfights and nightclubs, where you could enjoy a perfectly legal cocktail and listen to 1924 dance music like this.