Home style Vinaigrette

Making a home made vinaigrette

Making your own dressing is a great skill to have. You can make your own vinaigrette out of every day items in your pantry. More importantly, it is much more economical that constantly buying bottled dressings.

When making a vinaigrette, you will always mix 3 parts olive oil to 1 part vinegar. However, if you are substituting a lesser amount of lemon juice for the vinegar, you will have to adjust your level of olive oil at the
same ratio. Since you are going to be tasting the olive oil directly, you will want to make sure you use the best available.

Making vinaigrette is a two handed job – one to whisk and one to add the oil. During the process, you need to make sure that the bowl stays stationary. You can either used a towel (moisten it and wrap it around perimeter of bowl) or if you have one, a rubber bottomed bowl. You will need something that has traction on the counter.

The first thing you are going to do is add a bit of salt to the vinegar and let it dissolve. You can add it later but vinegar allows the salt to dissolve more readily that it will once you have added the oil. Put in a dollop of Dijon, this will serve as your emulsifier for the oil and vinegar. Whisk until mustard is combined then you will gradually fold in the olive oil, pouring it in a slow steady stream as you constantly whisk. Continue the process until the dressing has emulsified completely. Taste, if you wish you may add additional salt and pepper at this time to get the proper flavor.

This is only a basic vinaigrette, you can play with it by using different infused oils or flavored vinegars (i.e. champagne, cider). You can also add things like citrus, herbs, garlic and shallots. This dressing can be used for pasta salad, drizzled over veggies, tossed with your greens or as a marinade for meats and fish.

make a vinaigrette

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