The latest issue of Fine Cooking Magazine has nine different salad dressings that all look pretty good. We make all our own dressings – of course we do – and most of the time lean towards variations on oil and vinegar. When there’s a half-dozen different oils and even more different vinegars – along with a yard full of fresh herbs – it’s easy to make something different every night.
But man does not live by oil and vinegar, alone. Every now and again, something different this way comes. The Sweet and Spicy French Dressing I made last week is a prime example. It came from the same issue of the magazine and whetted the appetite for some newer salad flavors. And that’s where tonight’s Buttermilk Ranch Dressing comes into play.
I followed the online recipe fairly close – but just threw everything into a blender. It was so much easier than grating onion.
Buttermilk Ranch Dressing
- 1/2 cup buttermilk
- 1/3 cup mayonnaise
- 1/3 cup crème fraîche
- 2 tsp. minced onion
- 1-1/2 tsp. lemon juice
- 1-1/2 tsp. chopped Italian parsley
- 1/2 tsp. minced garlic
- 1 tsp fresh thyme
- 1/4 tsp paprika
- S&P, as desired
Place everything into a blender and process until smooth.
The dressing was the perfect compliment to the salad – iceberg lettuce, hard cooked egg, blackberries, blueberries, rainier cherries, julienned yellow and green zucchini, and slices of turkey breast I cooked earlier on the grill outside.
Fairly yumlicious.
Starting next week – my first week of retirement – we plan on doing a bit of tightening up the eating habits a bit. My goal is to start cooking smaller portions all the way through. It’s been working with the desserts, now it’s time to get serious about the rest of the things we eat.
I’m not going to be looking at ingredients, calories, or anything else. Focusing on a single ingredient is never a smart move. Instead, I’m just going to be making less – which, for me, is not necessarily going to be easy. I’ve always been a quantity cook with a generous appetite, but I’m now going to have the time to focus on doing things right instead of expediently.
I’m looking froward to new culinary adventures!