Wholesome Family Ranch Dressing
This is my “house” ranch dressing, tested and perfected after many years of making ranch dressing for my two boys, who will happily dip, drizzle, pour, and spread this creamy, tangy concoction onto almost any food… and promptly devour it all. Made with fresh herbs and lemon juice in a base of Greek yogurt and buttermilk, it is fresher-tasting and much better for you than the store-bought bottled stuff, which is made with lots of preservatives and artificial ingredients that we can barely pronounce. We occasionally enjoy it poured over a crisp, green salad instead of my go-to homemade balsamic vinaigrette, but most often my boys use it as a dip for any and all vegetables. The recipe as written makes a ranch dressing with a semi-thick yet pourable consistency, so for us it works equally well as a salad dressing or a veggie dip, but if you want a thicker ranch “dip,” feel free to use a little more Greek yogurt (or a little less buttermilk) to get the consistency you’d like. Just keep in mind that you might have to adjust the seasonings a bit if you increase or decrease the amounts of the base ingredients.
I hope that you love this version as much as my family does, but I also hope that you’ll make this recipe your own, adjusting it to your own tastes and preferences. As I told the middle-school students when I was teaching them how to make this dressing in the classroom, depending on the brand and type of ingredients you use (e.g., a lower-fat Greek yogurt or a stronger-tasting olive oil), your dressing might not come out quite the same when you make it at home. So you might have to play around with the acidic ingredients and/or the salt to strike that perfect balance between salt, acid, and fat/creaminess to arrive at YOUR favorite ranch dressing. But once you do, take good notes, and then eventually commit it to memory, because I’m certain you won’t go back to store-bought ranch dressing!
VEGETARIAN, GLUTEN-FREE
Yield: About 1 cup
I hope that you love this version as much as my family does, but I also hope that you’ll make this recipe your own, adjusting it to your own tastes and preferences. As I told the middle-school students when I was teaching them how to make this dressing in the classroom, depending on the brand and type of ingredients you use (e.g., a lower-fat Greek yogurt or a stronger-tasting olive oil), your dressing might not come out quite the same when you make it at home. So you might have to play around with the acidic ingredients and/or the salt to strike that perfect balance between salt, acid, and fat/creaminess to arrive at YOUR favorite ranch dressing. But once you do, take good notes, and then eventually commit it to memory, because I’m certain you won’t go back to store-bought ranch dressing!
VEGETARIAN, GLUTEN-FREE
Yield: About 1 cup
Author: Wholesome Family Kitchen
Ingredients
- • ½ cup plain Greek yogurt (preferably whole milk)
- • ⅓ cup buttermilk*
- • 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil (preferably a mild-flavored one; this is my favorite)
- • 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
- • 2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice (from about half of a small lemon)
- • 1 teaspoon white-wine vinegar (optional)**
- • 1 small garlic clove, peeled and finely minced (about ¼ teaspoon)
- • 1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh parsley leaves (or more to taste)***
- • 1 teaspoon finely chopped fresh chives (or more to taste)***
- • ¼ to ½ teaspoon kosher salt, or to taste
- • Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Instructions
- Put the yogurt, buttermilk, and olive oil in a small bowl or liquid measuring cup and mix with a whisk until smooth and well-combined. Add the rest of the ingredients and mix well again. Taste the dressing: Does it need more tang or brightness (vinegar or lemon juice) or freshness (herbs)? Does it taste “flat” and need more salt? If so, add it, then taste again.
- You can serve the dressing right away, but for best results, transfer the dressing to a jar or other lidded container, cover, and refrigerate for an hour before serving, to allow the flavors to blend and develop. The dressing can be stored, tightly covered in the refrigerator, for up to 3 days.
Notes
* If you don’t have buttermilk, you can use whole or low-fat milk instead, but you’ll need to add another teaspoon of lemon juice (or vinegar) to approximate the tanginess of the buttermilk. For best results, measure ⅓ cup of milk into a measuring cup, then stir in 1 teaspoon of lemon juice (or vinegar). Let it sit for 5 to 10 minutes before adding it to the rest of the ingredients.
** I’ve listed the white-wine vinegar as an optional ingredient, but, truth be told, I always add it. However, depending on the tanginess and creaminess of your yogurt and buttermilk, you might not need it. My advice? When making this dressing for the first time, leave out the white-wine vinegar, then taste the dressing. If you want more sharpness, or you need to cut through the creaminess of the yogurt a bit more, add the white-wine vinegar. (If you want more lemon flavor or brightness, add another ½ to 1 teaspoon of lemon juice instead of, or in addition to, the vinegar.) You can also substitute white-wine vinegar for all of the lemon juice if you don’t have any lemons on hand, but keep in mind that the white-wine vinegar has a sharper taste, so you might need less. (Apple-cider vinegar could also work fine in a pinch.)
*** My boys like this dressing best with fresh chives and parsley (preferably flat-leaf Italian parsley, which is more flavorful than the curly variety), but occasionally I use only one herb or the other, depending on what’s available at the grocery store and what’s (miraculously) growing in my garden, and no one has complained. Feel free to play around with other herbs too: Dill is traditional, thyme is another good option, and basil is a particularly lovely addition in the summer. (Imagine a basil-flecked ranch dressing drizzled over a platter of perfectly ripe, thickly sliced summer tomatoes—yum!) And since you need such a small amount of fresh herbs for this dressing, I taught my kids (and my students) that you don’t even need to drag out a knife and cutting board to chop the herbs. Just use a clean pair of kitchen scissors (not the scissors you use for your arts-and-crafts projects) and carefully snip the (washed and dried) herbs into the smallest pieces you can, right into the dressing.
And if you don’t have any fresh herbs on hand, dried herbs are fine to use (although the fresh herbs really make the dressing shine). Just be sure to use less (about ⅓ to ½ the amount of fresh herbs), as the flavor of the dried herbs is more concentrated.
MAKE IT DAIRY-FREE: For the few students I taught who were sensitive to dairy, I made a dairy-free honey mustard dressing with them instead. (I’ll share this recipe soon!) I haven’t tried making this ranch dressing dairy-free, but if you want to give it a try, you could start by substituting unsweetened non-dairy yogurt and unsweetened non-dairy milk for the Greek yogurt and buttermilk, then go from there, adjusting the amounts of the other ingredients to suit your tastes.
** I’ve listed the white-wine vinegar as an optional ingredient, but, truth be told, I always add it. However, depending on the tanginess and creaminess of your yogurt and buttermilk, you might not need it. My advice? When making this dressing for the first time, leave out the white-wine vinegar, then taste the dressing. If you want more sharpness, or you need to cut through the creaminess of the yogurt a bit more, add the white-wine vinegar. (If you want more lemon flavor or brightness, add another ½ to 1 teaspoon of lemon juice instead of, or in addition to, the vinegar.) You can also substitute white-wine vinegar for all of the lemon juice if you don’t have any lemons on hand, but keep in mind that the white-wine vinegar has a sharper taste, so you might need less. (Apple-cider vinegar could also work fine in a pinch.)
*** My boys like this dressing best with fresh chives and parsley (preferably flat-leaf Italian parsley, which is more flavorful than the curly variety), but occasionally I use only one herb or the other, depending on what’s available at the grocery store and what’s (miraculously) growing in my garden, and no one has complained. Feel free to play around with other herbs too: Dill is traditional, thyme is another good option, and basil is a particularly lovely addition in the summer. (Imagine a basil-flecked ranch dressing drizzled over a platter of perfectly ripe, thickly sliced summer tomatoes—yum!) And since you need such a small amount of fresh herbs for this dressing, I taught my kids (and my students) that you don’t even need to drag out a knife and cutting board to chop the herbs. Just use a clean pair of kitchen scissors (not the scissors you use for your arts-and-crafts projects) and carefully snip the (washed and dried) herbs into the smallest pieces you can, right into the dressing.
And if you don’t have any fresh herbs on hand, dried herbs are fine to use (although the fresh herbs really make the dressing shine). Just be sure to use less (about ⅓ to ½ the amount of fresh herbs), as the flavor of the dried herbs is more concentrated.
MAKE IT DAIRY-FREE: For the few students I taught who were sensitive to dairy, I made a dairy-free honey mustard dressing with them instead. (I’ll share this recipe soon!) I haven’t tried making this ranch dressing dairy-free, but if you want to give it a try, you could start by substituting unsweetened non-dairy yogurt and unsweetened non-dairy milk for the Greek yogurt and buttermilk, then go from there, adjusting the amounts of the other ingredients to suit your tastes.
Recipe by Wholesome Family Kitchen at https://www.wholesomefamilykitchen.com/recipe-wholesome-family-ranch-dressing-teaching-kids-to-cook/