Making homemade salad dressing is one of the top essential skills for any home cook. Nothing but a little olive oil and vinegar, and you can have dressing for days! It’s infinitely more delicious than purchased bottles. Plus, you can avoid random preservatives and additives and get rid of the centuries-old crusty bottles of ranch in your refrigerator. Here’s the best basic salad dressing recipe that we’ve been making for years!
How to make homemade salad dressing: a few tips!
Here’s one thing to note about homemade salad dressing: the amount of oil is critical! Don’t try to get away with less in an attempt to make it lighter. The oil is needed to correctly make the emulsion: that creamy, magical combination of vinegar suspended in oil. Other than that, there’s not much to know about this simple dressing. Because salad dressing should be just that: simple. This one requires no mincing of garlic or shallot. Just combine olive oil, vinegar, mustard, and a little honey, and whisk away. Homemade salad dressing is easily customizable to your own tastes. A few dressing tips:
Use a 3 to 1 ratio of oil versus vinegar.For the acid, you can substitute balsamic, red wine, apple cider, or sherry vinegar, OR lemon, lime, or orange juice (play with quantities to taste).Feel free to add in chopped herbs, minced garlic, minced shallot, or fancy salts.
How to store homemade salad dressing
How to store salad dressing you’ve made at home? Place the dressing in a glass jar with a tight lid, and store it in the refrigerator. Bring the dressing to room temperature, then stir before serving. The olive oil solidifies when it’s cold, but it defrosts quickly after a few minutes on the counter. Listen: On the topic of homemade salad dressing, our latest A Couple Cooks Podcast episode is all about it! Plus, it includes a sweet giveaway of 3 bottles of California Olive Ranch olive oil — see the podcast page for details.
More salad dressing recipes
Why make homemade salad dressing recipes instead of buying them? They’re healthier than store-bought (with no preservatives or added salt and sugar), quick and easy to make, and they taste amazing. Here are some of our top salad dressing recipes:
Homemade Ranch dressing is seriously tasty and takes just 5 minutes: why buy it again? Caesar dressing recipe has a healthy spin using Greek yogurt and ParmesanHomemade Italian dressing is zingy, full of flavor, and easy to make at homeLemon vinaigrette tastes like pure lemon, and uses only 4 ingredientsStrawberry salad dressing is lightly sweet, tangy, and totally addictive!Balsamic vinaigrette is super classic, tangy, and easy to make at homeGreek salad dressing is a simple oil and vinegar dressing that comes together in less than 5 minutesHomemade honey mustard dressing is sweet and tangy: and it’s easy to make!Avocado dressing is bright green, tangy and savory, perfect for drizzling on salads and bowl meals
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