Salad dressing is one of the first things you'll start making as you begin cooking at home. It's insanely easy, it's much less expensive, and it tastes WAY better than the store bought. It's also a lot healthier - this is a great way to start cutting out some of the additives in your diet. Check out any salad dressing label and you'll see what I mean.
If you just make it with vinegar and oil and mustard, it'll last forever too, and you can add more herbs/ spices as you go. In this article, I'll share a base dressing recipe that you can use to create many different dressings - just change up the vinegar. I'll also share the three dressings I make most often, and some ideas for different salad/ dressing combos. You won't need to eat the same salad twice for months (unless you want to)!
This isn't complicated, but it's important. In order to get the oil and vinegar to stay together, you need to emulsify the dressing. This can be done by using an emulsifying ingredient (Dijon mustard), or by blending the oil and vinegar (an immersion blender in a mason jar works beautifully for this, but tends to make the dressing much thicker).
That's it! Super easy. Below, I'll share recipes for the three salad dressings I make most often.
Whisk 1 tablespoon Dijon, 2 tablespoons of honey, and 1/4 cup of balsamic vinegar together. Slowly add 3/4 cups of olive oil in a thin stream, whisking all the while. Whisk in salt and pepper to taste. Optionally, add 1 clove minced garlic.
Whisk 1 tablespoon Dijon, 2 tablespoons of maple syrup and 1/4 cup of red wine vinegar together. Slowly add 3/4 cups of olive oil in a thin stream, whisking all the while. Whisk in salt and pepper to taste.
This creamy dressing is perfect for cabbage, but can also be used as a creamy dressing on salads or as the base for other flavors.
Whisk 1/4 cup of white vinegar, 1/4 cup of granulated sugar, and one cup of vegan mayonnaise together until you can see the sugar crystals have started to melt into the dressing. Whisk in salt and pepper to taste.
And there you have it! Three basic dressings that you'll use often. And just for fun, here are some ideas for salad dressing/ combos and even more variations:
Do you make your own dressing, or will you try any of these? Tell us what your favorite dressing is in the comments!