My Go To Salad Dressing Formula
Homemade salad dressings and off the shelf salad dressings, couldn’t be more different. Anything thats designed to sit in a bottle on a shelf for a long time has got too many compromises in terms of flavour and quality of ingredients. For me at least anyway, and if you clicked on this blog post then I’m sure for you too.
The thing is I think people get confused and maybe a little over whelmed when it comes to making their own dressings. But the reality is when you make them yourself, they’re not complicated, they’re much more cost effective, you can choose your own ingredients and you can completely customise them to your tastes.
The possibilities are quite literally endless!
So I’ve put together a simple framework to show you how I go about making my salad dressings and I’ll make 3 different versions following this framework to show you how versatile it is.
Classic French Vinaigrette (the corner-stone of salad dressings)
This salad dressing is the cornerstone of salad dressings, it's the first dressing I learnt to make when I started my career as a young trainee chef. This one dressing teaches you everything you need to know about how to make salad dressings, from balancing flavours to how to perform an emulsification.
Ingredients
- FLAVOURINGS & INGREDIENTS TO HELP WITH EMULSIFICATION
- - 2 tsp Honey
- - Salt
- - 2 heaped tsp whole grain mustard
- ACIDITY
- - 100ml White wine vinegar
- OIL
- - 200ml Olive oil
- - 100ml neutral oil
- CONSISTENCEY
- - Water to loosen if needed
Instructions
- Add all of the ingredients except the oil and water into a bowl, whisk until the salt and honey have dissolved into the vinegar.
- Whilst whisking slowly pour the oil it's to get an emulsification
- Once all the oil is in taste, just the sweetness, saltiness or sourness with more acid, sweetener or salt. And if too thick, adjust the consistency with a dash of water.
Sun-dried Tomato and Garlic Dressing
This tomato and garlic salad dressing strikes a perfect balance between light and acidic vinaigrettes and the more rich and creamy salad dressings at the other end of the spectrum. This dressing sits perfectly in the middle, it has body, deep flavour with acidic flavours. It really brings your salad to life.
Ingredients
- FLAVOURINGS & INGREDIENTS TO HELP WITH EMULSIFICATION
- - 2 tsp light brown sugar (could be maple, honey, agave, or other sugars)
- - Pinch salt
- - Freshly ground black pepper, to your liking
- - 1 small garlic clove
- - 8 sun-dried tomato halves, if the not in oil version then rehydrate and keep the water
- - 2 heaped tsp Dijon mustard
- ACIDITY
- - 80ml red wine vinegar (balsamic, white wine, sherry or apple cider vinegar)
- OIL
- - 200ml (160ml) extra virgin olive oil
- CONSISTENCEY
- - Water on stand-by to loosen to the correct consistency
Instructions
- Add all of the ingredients to a high-sided container except for the oil and water, and blend into a fine paste using a stick blender.
- Once you have a paste, add all of the oil in one go, start with your blender at full speed at the bottom, and pull up to emulsify all of the oil. Blend for a little time as possible, to reduce the chances of making the olive oil to bitter (see video)
- Adjust the seasonings as needed, and add a little water if the dressing needs thinning out.
Fresh Avocado Dressing
This avocado salad dressing is a fantastic alternative to the usual creamy dressing like ranch, caesar or blue cheese. It has all of those creamy qualities, but it just comes in a different package. It suits many styles of salad leaf, just don't use anything too young and fragile, so think things like romaine, little gem, radicchio, leaves that have some strength
Ingredients
- FLAVOURINGS & INGREDIENTS TO HELP WITH EMULSIFICATION
- - Pinch salt
- - Freshly ground black pepper, to your liking
- - 2 tablespoon fresh dill / chives / parsley / coriander
- - 1 small garlic clove
- - 1/2 ripe avocado, pitted 220g whole avo
- ACIDITY
- - Juice of 2 lemon (or enough to get 60ml)
- OIL
- - 160ml neutral tasting oil
- CONSISTENCEY
- - Water to loosen
Instructions
- Add all of the ingredients to a high-sided container, except the oil and water, then blend into a fine puree.
- Then slowly stream the oil whilst blending to create an emulsion.
- Finally, taste and adjust the seasonings and add some water to loosen the consistency if needed.