Wise call using the real thing (garlic & onions). I always do. Don't buy the salt/powder versions.

My favorite is Sensation. It was created at a local restaurant back in the 70s. Many restaurants still serve a version. It's a mix of olive oil, fresh garlic, lemon juice, and Pecorino Romano cheese.

Super yummy I bet! I always love a great dressing. I like to make a honey mustard dressing and put it on top of lettuce with cherry tomatoes, chicken, avocado and cheese.

I put a bit of vinegar, a couple tablespoons of whole grain mustard, a tablespoon of worstechire (is that how you spell it? Lol), 1/3 cuz honey and two tablespoons of Dijon. Oh, and pepper.

This is Ina Garten's vinaigrette recipe to be used on her panzanella salad. The salad called for basil leaves and I didn't have any so I added 2 tsp of frozen basil to the dressing recipe and liked it so much that I've been using it on other types of salads, too.

vinaigrette:

• 1 teaspoon finely minced garlic
• 1/2 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 3 tablespoons Champagne vinegar
• 1/2 cup good olive oil
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper

My favorite is a recipe from my great-grandmother.

1/4 C Good Salad Olive

1/4 C White Sugar

1/8 C Apple Cider Vinegar

1/8 C Balsamic Vinegar

1 Tsp each of your preferred spices. (Celery Seed, Minced Garlic, Basil etc)

Classic French vinaigrette has Dijon mustard in it and that's what fun2be's recipe is. A trick from Cooks Illustrated - add some (not much) mayo to a classic vinaigrette. The mayo emulsifies the mixture and keeps it from separating back into oil and water for at least 30 minutes. Add a little more and it becomes creamy. Add some grated cheese to it or to the salad itself and it becomes creamier still.

In some parts of the UK, mayo is called "salad dressing" because that's what it's very often used for, alone or with supplemental flavors. The white salad dressing commonly seen in Germany is also mayo with other flavors added.

These all look delicious! My favorite is this one. It gets rave reviews every time I make it. http://chinesegrandma.com/2010/11/balsamic-vinaigrette/

Anyone got one that uses non fat Greek yogurt? Thank you so much.

I'm one of those that ****my changes to a recipe

This is my favorite to use with cole slaw: mix 1/2 c mayo with 2 Tbl cider vinegar **I use white wine vinegar, 2 tsp sugar, salt and pepper to taste. Best if you let it set in refrigerator overnight. Pour over coleslaw right before serving and toss JUST TO COAT

I have made my own salad dressings "forever" -- mostly vinaigrette but when my DD was growing up, I would feel guilty every year or so and BUY a bottle of salad dressing (thinking she was somehow deprived - BIG GRIN). We'd use it a couple of times and then I would throw it away months later when I was cleaning the fridge. We all like vinaigrette the best!

I used to make all of my salad dressings. One that I like on shrimp salad is Thousand Island. I haven't made it in awhile, but basically (I think) it was mayo and Heinz chili sauce....enough to color it pink. Add very finely minced stuffed olives, minced green or purple onions, and a finely grated boiled egg.

Lots of recipes to try! Thanks, everyone. I wanted to get back to this thread sooner, but I got distracted by a lot of snow and ice. Happy to say the power didn't go out.

I love the sumac dressing (not poison sumac!) served at my favorite Lebanese restaurant, and I've found that recipe in numerous places online. I'm also fond of a vinaigrette made with Major Grey's Chutney. I saw that on a cooking snow, but I've also see the recipe online.

A word about food blogs: For some reason it's become trendy for food bloggers to post endless photos of a dish, with a few lines of text between each photo. This makes it necessary to scroll and scroll, hoping the actual recipe will eventually turn up. Some (lazy?) bloggers don't even vary the images; they use one photo per recipe, posting it a bunch of times in the same entry. Anyone else find this annoying?

Alisande - YES, YES, YES!!! I hate all the photos. First show me the recipe, and then, if I find the ingredient list acceptable, I'll read thru the blog. With the list of things either my DH or I can't or don't eat, there is no point in reading the blog before I know we can eat it.

That dressing sounds good. I like lemon juice and olive oil with crushed garlic sometimes added to it. I will substitute orange juice for the lemon juice sometimes or pommegranate or grapefruit juice. I also love Ranch dressing but not from the bottle, I like it when it is made with the Ranch Dressing powder, milk and mayo but I don't make it very often. I love my dressings to be on the tart side

Alisande, I hate those food blogs! Blah, blah, blah, blah. Pioneer Woman is one of the worst.

Scott, have you tried making tzatziki to use as dressing? It's one of our favorites. Though fat free anything isn't the healthiest way to go, I don't see why it wouldn't work. You would just need to strain the yogurt longer to get rid of the excess water.

We like a nice Green Goddess dressing, it's so nice and fresh with all of the herbs. Tarragon is an underused herb and it's delicious in the Green Goddess.

Ah, tarragon! I remember it being used a lot when I lived in NYC; then when we moved away it sort of disappeared. Here's the recipe I use to make homemade tartar sauce. I think it's the best! I usually add the minced capers and green olives, but it's good without them too.

1 cup mayo

1 tsp. each prepared mustard, crumbled dried chervil, crumbled dried tarragon, and minced parsley

1 sweet pickle, chopped (or sweet pickle relish)

1 tsp. chopped chives (or green onion)

dash of garlic powder (optional)

green olives and capers (optional)

Mix all ingredients and chill

I've made this a time or two for get-togethers and it's been well received. It's the original Green Goddess Salad.

This recipe appeared in an article in The NY Times by Jane Nickerson. It comes from ‘‘The California Cook Book,’’ by Genevieve Callahan.

1 clove garlic, minced

1/3 cup mayonnaise

1 tablespoon white-wine vinegar

1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce

2 teaspoons minced chives

6 anchovy fillets (in oil), drained and finely chopped

1 tablespoon oil from the anchovy tin

Cracked pepper

1 tablespoon chopped parsley

1 large head romaine, washed and thoroughly dried.

1. Place the garlic in a large salad bowl. Using a whisk, blend in the mayonnaise, vinegar, Worcestershire sauce, chives, anchovies and anchovy oil. Add cracked pepper to taste. Let stand at room temperature for an hour or longer to help meld the flavors.

2. Just before serving, add the parsley and half of the romaine leaves, torn into bite-size pieces, to the bowl. Toss until the dressing is well distributed and coats all of the leaves. Add the remaining romaine leaves as needed and toss until completely coated with the dressing.

jrb...1/3 cup mayo?? I'm not so sure about that.

What can I say? "Fake news"? Take it up with the NY Times http://www.nytimes.com/2008/11/09/magazine/09Food-t-001.html?action=click&contentCollection=Magazine&module=RelatedCoverage&region=Marginalia&pgtype=article

Yes, picture after picture, even when the item is finished. One whole, one of a bit on the fork, etc etc.

I make a copycat Catalina dressing that we like. It makes a full bottle, and a friend of ours always asks me to make him a new bottle, and he pays me.

There used to be a wonderful old hotel in St Louis known for it's outstanding food. It was "destination dining" before that became a "thing" in hotels. They are long gone, but were nice enough at one time to share their famous salad dressing recipe with the local newspaper. The results are pretty much like a Caesar salad. It's very thick and it fabulous on a roast chicken or roast turkey sandwich as well!

MAYFAIR DRESSING

1 clove garlic

1 rib celery -- sliced

1/2 onion - med size, cut in chunks

1-2oz can flat anchovies, drained

3 whole eggs

1 tsp freshly ground black pepper

1 tsp Accent - heaping

1/2 tsp granulated white sugar

2 Tbl mustard - type is your choice

1 Tbl lemon juice

2 cups good olive oil

Put garlic, celery, onion, anchovies , mustard, lemon juice and seasons in a blender or food processor. Blend till well mixed. Add eggs - blend 5 seconds. Add oil 1 Tbs at a time until 1/2 oil has been added. Then had remainder in a steady, slow stream.

Serve over Romaine lettuce. Refrigerate remainder of dressing - it will keep for up to two weeks if it lasts that long. It's delicious!

I hate those food blogs where you have to scroll through a dozen pictures to get to the recipe.

I will have to try your tartar sauce, Alisande. Except I would try it with Claussen dills. (As far as I am concerned, that is the only dill pickle in existence.) I make mine with mayo, stuffed green olives, purple onions, and chopped Claussen dills. I sometimes add capers, if I have them. We eat a lot of seafood, and I make a batch of tartar sauce about once a week. I end up eating it on crackers too. It is good as a sandwich dressing....I mainly eat ham sandwiches, and use it. If I have enough of it on hand, I add some mustard and use it on potato salad. The Thousand Island recipe I posted is good on sandwiches too. I used to make Green Goddess in the blender, but my recipe called for lots of parsley, which gave it the green color. Anchovies too.

Marilyn, my parents were big fans of Claussen dill pickles too. If I buy dill pickles, that's the brand.

Anglophilia, I wonder how the dressing would be without the MSG (Accent). I haven't thought about Accent for years. It's probably on supermarket shelves, but I never notice it. I do know it doesn't have a very good reputation.

Jrb451, you're another one who has me hungry for anchovies right now.

Alisande, I noticed the same thing! Haven't made this dressing in years and as I was typing it I thought "Accent"? Haven't bought any in years, either. I Googled it and yes, it does still exist.

I think it's pretty much MSG with a bit more added. I have no idea if it would taste different without it, but I'd give the recipe a try without it - just included it as it was a part of the original recipe. Some people are very sensitive to it, others are not. It has never bothered me.

Several years ago we were at a restaurant in Nee York state. DH got the house dressing. It was a honey mustard with horse radish in it. He decided that I needed to make it for him. So online I went. The recipe I found didn't have horse radish in it, so I added it.

1/4c cider vinegar

1/2 c oil (DH doesn't like olive oil in it)

1 t dried oregano leaf

1 T Parmesan cheese

1 1/2 T each of honey and mustard. I use stadium mustard as that is what DH prefers.

Shake well. I add about a heaping teaspoon of horse radish.

alisande, I think your info on Accent (monosodium glutimate) is dated. A small percentage of people do react to glutimates but they're far more likely to encounter it in regular food than because of supplements like Accent.

In the food world, it's agreed these days that there is a fifth taste sensation called umami to go with sweetness, sourness, bitterness, and saltiness. The sense of umami (which comes from glutimates) makes the food taste meaty or savory.

Many foods are naturally high in umami components (glutimates) - mushrooms, tomatoes (especially sauteed tomato paste), soy sauce, anchovies, East Asian fish sauce, etc. These items are frequently added to recipes to "boost" the overall flavor. In the case of things like soy sauce or anchovies or fish sauce, these are often included for their glutimate content but in amounts that rarely impart any separate flavor at all.

You can use foods high in glutimates to up the umami content. Or, you can shake a little Accent into what you're cooking.

Elmer, what part of my info on Accent is dated? The part where I said I haven't noticed it on my supermarket shelves? The only other thing I said was that it doesn't have a very good reputation. Perhaps I should have qualified that statement by saying it doesn't have a very good reputation with some groups of people and certain physicians.

I used to see MSG in most canned soups, but I think it was removed some time ago. I could be wrong, though. I use hon dashi powdered bonito soup stock in some Japanese dishes, but that's the only MSG source I'm aware of using.

Seeing Scott's request for versions that use non-fat dairy reminded me of something. I made a salad dressing a few weeks ago that used cucumber as the thickener. All of the ingredients were just blended together in the blender. Can't remember where I got the recipe now. It's in one of the (too many) cookbooks on my shelf. It was alright, and I am definitely going to experiment with it some more. It had poppy seed in it, too.

So-called Chinese Restaurant Syndrome and the accusatory fingers pointed at glutimates as something dangerous were ideas not accepted by everyone and anyway were long ago discredited. I believe this was the source of what you called the "not very good reputation". Or were you thinking of something else? And not a good reputation with "certain physicians"? What does that mean?

I don't often eat canned soups or other concoctions but you can be sure most have glutimate-rich ingredients with less potentially misunderstood names than MSG. The Japanese have long been on the forefront of identifying and using glutimate-rich ingredients. Japanese food is very glutimate heavy. That's why so many dishes taste savory and delicious.

J Kenji Lopez-Alt is a respected and innovative chef who's very into the science of food and cooking. Formerly with the Cooks Illustrated operation, he's now doing other things (including writing books) and is associated with the website Serious Eats. I recently made his stew recipe and it includes some unusual ingredients as well as what he describes as an "umami bomb" to jolt the flavor. Soy sauce, tomato paste, anchovies, Worchestershire sauce (which has anchovies in it). The end result was delicious.

The not so good reputation you refer to is what exactly?

The not so good reputation you refer to is what exactly?

Do you really care about the answer, Elmer, or are you just giving me a hard time as usual? In either case, I don't have the energy to discuss this today, I suggest you Google MSG and see what comes up. That's what I did.

MSG is in a lot of packaged/canned foods...I know because my husband can't eat it and it's heck trying to avoid it!

Answers to your questions are Yes, then No, of course not.

I googled, got to a Mayo Clinic page, and found this:

"However, researchers have found no definitive evidence of a link between MSG and these symptoms."

I do a raspberry vinigrette for summer salads - I add cut up strawberries and/or raspberries to the greens, some pecan halves as well. Just sub the regular balsamic vinegar with a raspberry one.

Recipes are just suggestions. I usually use whatever I have on hand. ;)

I've tried some various recipes. I'm looking for a good cilantro lime dressing. There is a local restaurant that has a salad that is basically a chunky salsa/pico de gallo type salad with cucumber, avocado and cilantro lime dressing. I cannot stop eating it. It's really fresh and addictive. That dressing is what puts it over the top.

For those that do not react to MSG, you are lucky. I know it is a very real and painful additive. When it occurs naturally, I am fine. It is the added MSG that gets me. Aldi's is a "NO added MSG" store. It is my new best friend. LOL