Dressing for idiots! (salad dressing)

Becky Lawson wrote:Where I lived in Brazil for a while, the only salad dressing I saw used was mixed on the salad at the time of making.  No prep or need to store.

On top of already made salad:
salt and pepper to taste
squeeze of lime juice
splash of apple cider vinegar
splash of oil

Mix with bare hands (very important part)

Agreed!  Simplest is best.  Though I don't quite understand the value of mixing with bare hands...?

I will occasionally prepare a specialty dressing, like blue cheese or Ceasar, or concoct some recipe based on yogurt or tahini, or blend berries or garlic or mustard or salt-cured lemon into my dressings.  But most of the time, I add just a few ingredients directly to the salad as I serve it, then toss and eat.  No measurements.  No emulsification.  No leftovers.

For me, this usually means just a good quality olive oil, a good quality vinegar, salt, and fresh ground pepper.  The OP asked for simple, and you can't get much simper than this.

The key is to add these to a salad with good ingredients that I want to shine through: good quality leafy greens, good cheese, and as available plenty of fresh herbs comprising up to a quarter of the total salad greens.  I like crunch with my salads, so I will usually throw on pepitas and/or sunflower seeds and/or nuts of some kind.

Finding oil that you like is essential.  I use one of just a few brands of extra-virgin olive oil (EVO) with a robust, fruity taste.  When I pour it, I want it to really smell like an olive.  I sometimes use a bit less EVO and add a splash of pumpkin seed oil and flax seed oil, but those additions are for the health benefits, not for the taste.  For taste, you can't beat a good EVO.  Occasionally I will substitute walnut oil for a specialty themed salad.  Posts above have highlighted the health benefits of raw avocado oil, which is absolutely true.  Yet for me, despite that I love eating avocados, I just don't like the taste of avocado oil on my salads.  Weird, I know.

Vinegar usually means home-brewed apple cider vinegar.  Depending on the type of salad I'm mixing, I will substitute balsamic, or red wine, or white wine, or sherry vinegar, or citrus juices as the mood strikes me.  Importantly, never use distilled white vinegar, which I reserve for cleaning purposes only.  I suspect this may be why traditional recipes use so much more oil than vinegar - if I were using such harsh tasting vinegar, I'd use less of it, too!

Mayo + ketchup = thousand island dressing

Mayo + Chichi's chunky salsa = Thousand Island Dressing

 (Chichi's brand has no Mexican spices such as cumin).

r ransom wrote:I suck at salads.  I can never get the dressing right.

What I need is a really simple recipe I can add to depending on my mood.  REALLY simple!  Like Idiot proof simple.  

And delicious.  The dressing has to be yummy too.

Does anyone have a fantastic dressing recipe that is so easy even I can make it?  

Well I dislike vinegar, and it doesn’t like me, so I use fresh lemon, which I love, but sub vinegar if you prefer it.

For a plain, basic, fool-proof dressing ratio:
use 1 part lemon juice to 3 parts olive oil. Salt. Pepper. Mix well.

To make it more delicious, or for certain veggie types in the salad, you add things you like:

Lemon zest of the lemon you used for juice
Minced shallots and garlic
Mustard
Chili flakes
Finely chopped herbs: oregano/dill/parsely/thyme/
Sesame tahini
Miso
Tamari sauce

For a milkier dressing blend in either avocado or a little buttermilk.

Add an egg yolk, grated Parmesan, and minced anchovy if you want an opaque, Cesar-like dressing. Blend with a stick blender.

If you like sweetness in your savory foods, some folks add sugar or honey to any of these dressings.
(I dislike that and never do it, personally)

Ketchup and mayonnaise makes thousand Island...  And Mayonnaise, vinegar and a sweetener makes coleslaw dressing. Cant get any easier than this

Everyone’s dressing recipes are so healthy so here is a kiwi classic that you will love or hate.

Tinned sweetened condensed milk, malt vinegar and dry mustard powder, mixed to taste.

It is totally unhealthy but evokes childhood memories of summer salads made with sliced iceberg lettuce, tomato and cucumber.

So I like to explore with a lot of different flavors. I often use the leftover brine of olive, pickle, pepper, kraut, or whatever kind of brine juice I have. I just like to add a little wetness and flavor to my salad, and we eat a LOT of salads, but I go light on or omit the oil, as it doesn't agree with me to well. Sometimes I'll use the brine as is, but generally I'll add spices fresh or dried. Anything goes, like basil, onion, garlic, chili, ginger, you name it, depending on the profile of the salad I'm making. If the brine has little or no vinegar, like black olive brine, I may throw in a little cider or wine vinegar. I really like brines that are spicy and sweet, add a little onion, basil, and pepper, and they go great with salads that have a little fruit and nuts in them. I put the added ingredients in the jar of leftover brine, shake it up, and it's ready. Have fun in the kitchen and just keep in mind the flavor of the meal it's going with when choosing a few add-ins.  

In my post 'a year ago' I wrote that balsamico is hard to find here. But now I found a really good one, even organic! The taste is great, combined with good quality olive oil, a little 'Greek style yoghurt' (soft cream-cheese is possible too) and lots of freshly picked herbs. It's the start of the season for the wild (foraged) herbs now here!

I just finished making broccoli salad for dinner. I use the same dressing for Coleslaw. 1 cup mayo,1 Tbsp Dijon mustard,  2 tbsp sugar, 2tbsp apple cider vinegar, I add orange or lemon zest. Remember it by  using 1122 referencing ingredient quantity. Salt and pepper to taste.

I will never forget my Brazilian husband visiting my mother's house in the US 30 years ago and his reaction to the myriad salad dressings (and individual salad bowls). Today you can find bottled dressings here on buffets and in markets, and the prices are still ridiculous, but almost always a salad is dressed simply-- some olive oil, some lime juice or wine vinegar, salt. It's generally added to your plate, so no individual bowls.

We don't eat much lettuce, but will make a salad out of any other fresh veg (in college I had a class with an ag professor who suggested banning lettuce and replacing it in every case with cabbage, which in turn would benefit the environment, health, etc. I took that to heart and to this day it affects our salads.....) We eat a lot of Japanese, Korean and Chinese food so I often will dress my salads with options leaning in those directions - sesame oil, shiso vinegar, plum vinegar, for example. Or my old standby, some miso mixed with vinegar, with a wee bit of sesame oil.
But 90% of the time, it's some kind of vinegar, some kind of oil, and something salty.

My most fantastic and easy salad dressing I learned from my mother: make the salad, sprinkle with lemon juice, olive oil, and salt, top with seeds. This is my to go, although I occasionally use others but they're more time consuming. You can substitute lemon with vinegar but I prefer the tanginess of the lemon. Delicious. Never fails to impress me 😂

It might be a little off-topic, but I want to say that much better than the ordinary store-bought lettuce is freshly picked lamb's lettuce (aka mâche or corn salad) from the garden!

Not sure how “idiot-proof” this dressing is, but my “fancy” dressing when I want something with a bit more to it than just oil and vinegar is a Dijon dressing. I take a spoonful/forkful of Dijon mustard and put it into a small 4oz jar, then whisk it as best I can with a fork while drizzling in a little bit of good olive oil. Once it gets a bit airy and the volume has maybe roughly doubled, I mix in some apple cider vinegar/lemon juice and some maple syrup. Takes about 2 minutes start to finish and makes an excellent dressing.