Posts Tagged ‘salad dressing’

A restaurant near us makes this dressing to go along with their wings. It’s delicious! I tried to make my own version of this as I couldn’t find a recipe for it anywhere. It came out close to what they serve.

Tequila Lime Blue Cheese Dressing

Ingredients:
1/2 cup of mayonnaise
1/2 cup of sour cream
1/2 cup of blue cheese crumbles
1 shot of tequila
zest of one lime
juice of one lime
1 clove of garlic, minced
Sea salt and freshly cracked pepper, to taste
Directions:
Add all ingredients to a container; mix until well combined. Cover and refrigerate for two hours
before serving.

I actually put some of this in my black bean tacos Friday. Nice kick to it. I don’t know if I’d eat it on a salad, it is a bit spicy. But as a dip or an addition to tacos it’s awesome. Remember you can always save what is left in your can of chipotle peppers in adobe. Put it in the fridge for a couple of weeks or put it in a Ziplock and freeze it. Then you can grate what you need into dishes right out of the freezer.

Chipotle Ranch Dressing

Ingredients:

 
3/4 cup mayo (low fat is fine)
3/4 cup sour cream (low fat is fine or you can use plain yogurt)
2-3 canned chipotle peppers with 1 Tbsp sauce
1 Tbsp lime juice
1 small bunch of chives
Small handful of cilantro
1 clove garlic
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 tsp pepper
1/4 to 1/2 cup buttermilk
1 Tbsp ranch dressing mix (I use Penzey’s, this is optional but it ramps up the flavor)

 
Directions:

 
To make the dressing, place all dressing ingredients except the buttermilk in a blender.
Blend for 10 seconds. Check consistency and blend in buttermilk if desired (less buttermilk for
dipping, more for dressing).

 
Store in an air-tight jar in the fridge for a week or more.

I had a coupon (of course!) for blue cheese crumbles so decide to make some dressing. I used it as a dip too for my Parmesan chicken nuggets.

Blue Cheese Dressing

Ingredients:

 
1/2 cup of mayonnaise
1/2 cup of sour cream
1/2 cup of blue cheese crumbles
1 tbsp white wine vinegar
1 clove of garlic, minced
Sea salt and freshly cracked pepper, to taste

 
Directions:

 
Combine the mayonnaise, sour cream, blue cheese crumbles, vinegar, minced garlic, and sea
salt and black pepper, to taste; mix until well combined. Cover and refrigerate for two hours
before serving.

I’ve wanted to try this for a long time. I did some research into the copycat recipes. There are some differences in opinion on using milk or buttermilk, and paprika or cayenne. I made some substitutions. I used the buttermilk option. I for some reason do not have cayenne in my pantry (which I will fix soon), so I used the Arizona Dreaming mix from Penzeys instead. I keep Penzeys buttermilk ranch dressing mix in my pantry so I used that. It came out pretty darn close. I’m sure if I do the cayenne next time it will be near perfect. The big thing you HAVE to do is let this sit overnight. If you don’t the flavors won’t have time to meld together and it will taste more like mayo than anything else.

Outback Steakhouse Ranch Dressing (Copycat)

Ingredients

1 tablespoon hidden valley ranch dressing mix
1 cup mayonnaise (real mayo like Hellmans, not Miracle Whip)
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/4 teaspoon coarse black pepper
1/8 teaspoon garlic powder
1/8/ teaspoon cayenne pepper

Directions:

In a medium bowl, combine all of the ingredients and mix well.
Chill for at least 1 hour.  It’s best to let this sit overnight to bring all of the flavors together and let it thicken up.

This is perfect for anything. I used dried dill not fresh, and I used white vinegar not white wine vinegar. The substitutions didn’t mar the flavor at all. I let this sit overnight.

Creamy Ranch Dip

Ingredients

1/2 cup mayonnaise
1/2 cup sour cream
1 tablespoon white wine vinegar
2 teaspoons dry dill weed or 2 tablespoons chopped fresh dill
1 teaspoon granulated garlic
kosher salt and fresh cracked black pepper

Directions

Stir all ingredients together in a bowl. Chill for 30 minutes to let all the flavors mingle.

In my quest to eat less processed foods I have begun to make my own salad dressings. This is another recipe from Mary Ostyn’s book. I love salads and this dressing turned out great. I made this in my Good Seasons salad dressing cruet, fit perfectly. This dressing, like all vinaigrettes, will separate in the fridge. Shake before you use it to recombine the dressing.

Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing
Makes about 1 ¼ cups
½ cup vegetable oil
¼ cup water
¼ cup balsamic or cider vinegar
2 tablespoons grated Parmesan cheese
1 clove garlic, crushed
1 teaspoon dry mustard
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon sugar
1 teaspoon dried parsley
Combine all ingredients in pint size container with tight fitting lid. Shake Well.
Store in refrigerator for up to 2 months.