DIY Salad Dressings

Making your own Salad Dressing is easy, so much better than the stuff you find at the store, and allows you to make a much wider variety of flavors than available even on your supermarket shelf. We'll start with the basics and later I'll move in to more specific recipes.

Basically, to make a good salad dressing you want to form an emulsion. That is, the fat particles (read oil) are broken up into microscopic pieces spread equally among the other liquid (mostly water), in the case of salad dressing, ususally vinegar. The stuff you buy at the supermarket, with the exception of Ranch dressing, usually has stabilizers and/or emulsifiers in it to keep the oil and vinegar together for at least a few minutes when you shake it up. You can make your own dressing that is far better and creamier than the stuff you buy at the store-sans emulsifiers.

To start you need either a regular blender or a hand blender. Basic ingredients are:

Vinegar of choice (I would recommend a basic red or white wine vinegar here)
Dijon Mustard
Canola, Soy or other Veggie Oil
2-3 cloves garlic
1 Shallot
Water-the secret ingredient
Tabasco Sauce
Worcestershire Sauce
Fresh Thyme
Salt & Pepper

Put about a 1/4 cup vinegar, a tablespoon of mustard, the garlic, the shallot and a pinch of salt in the blender. Blend. Salt won't dissolve in oil so that's why you add it here first.

Slowly drizzle the oil into the running blender. Watch it closely and you will see it blend in and thicken if an emulsion is forming properly. With a little practice, you'll be able to know it's going well not just by how it looks, but by the sound it makes. If you add the oil too quickly, or you add too much, the emulsion will break and you will have water and oil. If it's going right, it will start to thicken like mayonnaise and you will notice. The trick here is patience-add that oil slowly!

Once it starts getting thick, add a teaspoon of water at a time to keep it at the right consistency. It shouldn't be thick like mayonnaise, and it shouldn't be so thin that it just runs off your salad greens. Salad dressing is a sauce; I like to apply the chef's rule for other sauces to dressing too. It should just coat the back of a spoon and should leave a line when you run your finger over the back.

You can add the fresh thyme if you wish at any point in the process. To finish it off, a dash of tabasco and a dash or Worcestershire will give it pep. You shouldn't be able to taste either of these, but you should notice the difference before adding and after. Your dressing will keep several days if not longer in the refrigerator. You may notice it starting to separate after a few days. That's ok, it just won't be as creamy as when you first made it. Shake it up hard before serving and it's ready to use.