I normally don’t post salad dressing recipes independently, usually it’s a part of the flavor profile of whatever salad I am making and I like to keep them together. But this Lemon Ginger & Garlic Vinaigrette quickly became a versatile new favorite of ours.
I first made it last summer when I spent a week in Ely. I had planned a week of salads for dinner since my parents like to eat salads. But when I was ‘home’ it wasn’t going to be the same old chicken, romaine, and dressing from a bottle every night. My dinner salads were going to have fresh homemade dressing and all sorts of fun accoutrements to them. This is one of the first dressings I made up there and it was declared a keeper with coveted leftovers.
The ginger and garlic make this is a great dressing to compliment a salad with an Asian flair but the lemon keeps it fresh enough to be used as a bright fresh summer dressing too.
Here’s what you need:
This recipe requires a lot of grating – I strongly suggest using a microplane. First we’ll zest a lemon, you’re looking for about a teaspoon. I like to hold my citrus in my hand and the microplane upside down. This allows the zest to be ‘caught’ in the microplane and you can easily see how much you’re accumulating. You also get a better view of the citrus to make sure you aren’t getting into the white part and only taking the zest.
Then still using the microplane, grate some garlic and ginger. I love to peel fresh ginger and keep it in the freezer. It grates so much easier from frozen – in fact, I was about to give up when I tried with fresh ginger. Just either measure it in inches (about 2 inches) or allow the grated ginger to thaw before measuring as it will start out like a pile of snow and slowly deflate as it thaws.
To the bowl with the ginger, garlic and lemon add equal parts olive and canola oils, fresh lemon juice, honey, dijon mustard and a little salt.
Whisk it all together until it becomes uniform in consistency or emulsified.
Taste and adjust based on your preference.
Serve on your favorite salad.
Stay tuned for my Asian Marinated Grilled Chicken and corresponding salad recipe in my next posts for a great salad idea for this dressing. Like the dressing the Asian Marinated Grilled Chicken is too versatile to be mentioned only in a salad recipe.
- ¼ c olive oil
- ¼ c canola oil
- 1 lemon, zest and juice of
- 2 T honey
- 2 T ginger, peeled and grated from frozen –about 2 inches
- 1 clove garlic, grated
- 1 t Dijon mustard
- ½ t kosher salt, to taste
- Whisk all dressing ingredients together vigorously until emulsified.
- Serve immediately or allow to sit for a couple hours.
- Store leftovers in the refrigerator for up to two weeks.
Canola oil extremely inflammatory and contains a chemical called hexane that is a neurotoxin – among other issues. If this were made with only olive oil then it would be a beautiful dressing.