Salad Dressings

Salad Dressing. One of the easiest items of a meal to prepare yet one of the most overlooked. Many cooks spend hours in the kitchen preparing one of their best meals.... and then serve the salad with supermarket dressing.

Whether you're prepping for a 30 min. meal, ala Food TV's Rachel Ray, or for the spread that takes several hours to prepare, an outstanding salad dressing takes only minutes.

Vinagrettes are probably the most misunderstood dressing yet the simplest to make. The reason I say misunderstood is people think it's difficult to make...not so. Mix 1 to 2 tablespoons of a vinegar or citrus with 6 tablespoons of oil, olive or vegetable. Add seasonings to taste and voila! an easy- to-do topping to your fresh greens. Change the quantity of oil to suit your taste buds. According to Julia Childs herbs of your choice are optional as is dry mustard. I prefer to use a wet mustard such as a Dijon type. Don't forget the salt and pepper. Julia also suggests adding all ingredients to a screw-top jar and shake vigorously for 30 seconds to blend thoroughly.

Another easy salad dressing is Thousand Island which Sandy D'Amato wrote about in recent edition of the Milwaukee Sentinel Journal . It had been years since I had tried a Thousand Island dressing and it was a bottled one from the local supermarket.

Not any more. Sandy suggested that the lowly iceberg lettuce would be an excellent foil for this Thousand Island dressing. Made several hours ahead and chilled, it was just as he described it. His recipe serves four. I always make a double batch. Use it for dipping things like al dente asparagus. Just a couple, of course, since the dressing is a bit on the rich side.

At any rate, try it and let me know. Click the title or here to get the recipe.