Making your own vinaigrettes and salad dressings
It’s Saturday morning, and I’m drinking a cup of coffee that I just brewed in our French press—ah, the weekend! I am going to head to the farmers’ market shortly to get our groceries for the week. I haven’t been to the market in a few weeks now—we just moved, and got settled into our new place—but that is no excuse. I miss it! The Guelph Farmers’ Market is really coming into its own right now—lots of fresh local veggies and meats—this is my favourite time of year to visit the market.
With all of the fresh vegetables, and the arrival of hot weather, late spring and summer are the perfect seasons for testing your salad-making skills. When it’s hot outside, the last thing I feel like doing is eating a hot meal. This week, I want to leave you with some ideas of how to make your own vinaigrettes and salad dressings. Personally, I don’t own a single store-bought dressing—I just prefer my own to anything.
No matter which salads I am making, I typically have all of the ingredients needed to make them in my pantry. I like to have olive oil on hand, as well as grapeseed oil, apple cider vinegar, white wine vinegar, balsamic vinegar, lemons, limes, garlic, and fresh and dried herbs, plus some sweetening agents when needed—like sugar and honey. By having all of these on hand, I am able to make a dressing in a couple of minutes for whatever kind of salad I may be serving.
A couple of my favourites are my Greek dressing and my honey cinnamon dressing, both of which I use on sweeter salads.
My Greek dressing is super easy to make and tastes so much fresher than the store-bought alternative. It consists of two parts olive oil to one part balsamic vinegar with a clove of minced garlic, salt-and-pepper, a pinch of dried oregano, and half a squeezed lemon. Once these are all mixed together, let the flavours mingle together for a few minutes, then pour it over the Greek salad. If you are making a traditional Greek salad, allow the dressing to soak into the vegetables and marinate a bit. If you are serving the salad with lettuce, and then pour the dressing on right before serving—no one likes soggy lettuce!
My honey cinnamon dressing is great on summer salads that have different fruits in them. In the summer, I love salads with green apples and fresh berries—this dressing was inspired by these kinds of salads, typically also topped with goat cheese. In this dressing, you can use either olive oil or grapeseed oil—if you have grapeseed oil on hand, I would recommend it, as its flavour is milder and won’t overpower the other flavours. This dressing consists of two parts grapeseed oil, one part apple cider vinegar, half a teaspoon of cinnamon, and a teaspoon of honey. Whisk together and taste, if you need to make the dressing sweeter, feel free to add a little more honey. The dressing should be sweet, but not too sweet, as the flavours in the salad will provide sweetness on their own.
Stay tuned for upcoming Simply Authentic columns, where I will share my adventures and experiences of venturing around the area and creating delicious and simple recipes that you can make in your kitchen.
Photo Courtesy LYNN GARDNER VIA CC BY-NC-SA 2.0