Dairy-Free Ranch Dressing

I wasn’t big on salads or any other vegetables as a child or teenager. I don’t recall my mother putting much effort into making three square meals or many vegetables but I do recall that I preferred ranch to vinaigrette when I was served salad in a restaurant. 

During my vegan years I made creamy dressings and dips from tofu, but they suffered from a beany after-taste. Store bought tofu and soy milk based ranch dressing tasted better than my renditions, but still lagged  behind my memory of ranch dressing.

For years I've been making delicious, creamy salad dressings and dips using cashew butter or tahini. I've enjoyed them and so have most of my friends, cooking students, and clients.

During one of my yogurt- and kefir-making phases, I made a fantastic yogurt-based ranch dressing, using a recipe from Melinda & Robert Blanchard’s cookbook, At Blanchard’s Table, as a starting point with ideas from other recipes I found on-line.

My cooking students loved it. Even people who don’t usually like ranch dressing loved it and so did their kids. It wasn’t dairy free, but I figured it was a huge improvement over store bought brands made from refined polyunsaturated vegetable oils (soy, corn, safflower, cottonseed, and canola oil), partially hydrogenated oils, MSG, and other unsavory ingredients.

Although I eat dairy products on occasion, they’re not a part of my daily diet, so I still pondered what I to use to make a dairy free version. I didn’t want to use tofu. For many of my cooking students, clients, and friends, dairy products are completely off limits (due to allergies, food intoleranes, autoimmune disorders, and other reasons).

For a while I was stumped. Then I found a recipe for Dairy-Free Ranch Style Dipping Sauce in the October/November 2008 issue of Living Without Magazine. It used blended cashews as the base along with mayonnaise. I followed the recipe to the quarter-teaspoon the first time. I liked it but found it too thick, a little too rich (I use full fat mayo, not the lite stuff), and thought it needed adjustment. So I combined my former yogurt ranch dressing with this recipe to create what you see below.

If you have additional ideas for improvement on this recipe, please let me know.

 Dairy-Free Ranch Dressing

Prep: 20 to 30 minutes        Yield: 2 to 2 1/cups

There must be as versions of ranch dressing as there are people who make it. Susan Vess who’s article “Kabobs for Kids” in the October/November 2008 issue of Living Without Magazine inspired this recipe below. I made some alterations to her recipe to create this creamy dip and salad dressing. Try it with a tossed green salad (you may need to add a dash of water to dilute), a blanched vegetable tray, or to make tuna, turkey, chicken, or egg salad.

Shopping for mayo: When shopping for mayo, look for a product with the simplest and fewest ingredients, one free of hydrogenated oil, as well as soy, safflower, cottonseed, corn oil. If you use canola make sure it’s organic to avoid GMOs (genetically modified organisms). Look for Omega 3 Mayo or grapeseed oil mayo in natural foods stores or make your own mayo at home using olive oil. I prefer Vegenaise Grapeseed Oil Mayo tastes great (look for it in the refrigerator section of natural foods stores). It contain grapeseed oil and trace amounts of soy protein but amounts to less than 1 gram per serving (far less soy than if I had used tofu as a base) and otherwise has very pure ingredients. Of course you could make your own mayo using light olive oil.

Ingredients:
3/4 cup raw cashews (whole rather than tiny pieces)
1/2 cup boiling water
1/4 cup cold water; 1 to 4 tablespoons additional water as needed to thin

3/4 cup homemade omega-3 mayo or Grapeseed oil Vegenaise 
1/4 cup minced scallions (white and most of green part) or 1 tablespoon freeze-dried onion flakes
3 tablespoons minced fresh parsley or 1 tablespoon dried
1 tablespoon creamy yellow mustard, dijon or creamy white mustard
1 ½ teaspoon each minced fresh tarragon, dill, and oregano or ½ teaspoon of each dried
1 ½ teaspoons minced or pressed fresh garlic or ½ teaspoon dried (double if desired)
1 tablespoon lemon juice or raw apple cider vinegar (double if desired)
1 teaspoon honey or agave nectar (double if desired; omit if mayo contains sweetener)
½ teaspoon finely ground, unrefined sea salt, or to taste (Celtic, Lima, Si, or Real Salt®)
1/4 teaspoon finely ground white pepper

1. Combine the cashews and boiling water in a blender or Vita-Mix and blend until smooth and  the consistency of cream.  Add 1/4 cup cold water and blend again.
2. In a medium bowl combine the mayo, scallions or dried onion flakes, parsely, mustard, tarragon, oregano, dill, garli, lemon juice, optional honey, sea salt, and white pepper. Add the cashew cream and whisk to combine. Add additional water, 1 tablespoon at a time as needed to thin. Taste and adjust salt as needed.
3.  Pour into a widemouth jar or empty salad dressing bottle. Label, date, and refrigerate.
4.  Cover and chill for at least 1 hour before serving for optimal flavor. Use within 3 weeks for best results. Note: I'm not sure how well this freezes. Let me know if you try it (Be sure to use a widemouth jar and leave an inch of space below the lip in the jar.)

Variation:

*  Yogurt Ranch Dressing: Some people who don't tolerate milk tolerate yogurt because the lactose has been pre-digested by the friendly bacteria. If you fall into this group, look for yogurt without added milk solids or non-fat dry milk powder.

Replace 3/4 cup cashews, 1/2 cup boiling water, and 1/4 cup cold water with 1 cup plain, full-fat yogurt, then increase mayo to 1 cup in the recipe above. If possible use raw milk yogurt. Yields 2 1/2 cups.

Comments

[Christi]

I am enjoying your posts. Can you recommend a substitute for those of us who cannot eat mayo? I can eat yogurt and sour cream. Thanks!