I really dislike buying salad dressing. If your house is anything like ours, then you know the next 2 stories by heart.

1) You open a bottle and get one good use out of it. Oh wait! I could be exaggerating. Maybe you’ll get two whole uses out of it. Then, it hits your fridge and somehow migrates to the back — and out of sight, out of mind. You’ll forget how long you’ve had it and when it comes time to use it again, you’ll wonder if it’s still good. In my home, Mitch and I will sniff at it…shake it about…and look dubiously at each other before we chuck it.

2) You plan on a salad with dinner, assuming there’s a bottle stashed somewhere in the house, only to find (1o minutes before dinner time) that there is no salad dressing anywhere in the house. How frustrating!!

A couple years ago, I became tired of that little dance and embarked on a journey to come up with my own salad dressing – one that I could whip up at a moments notice. After a few tries, I came up with this tart, fresh everyday salad dressing that we now use pretty much weekly. A nice thing about this recipe is that it’s not about specifics – you can vary things up however you’d like to come up with different flavors or to adjust the tartness, though we very much like it the way it is. I hope you’ll like it too.

Ways to personalize it:

1. Add a flavored balsamic vinegar, red wine vinegar, white wine vinegar, or champagne vinegar instead of lemon juice
2. Increase or decrease the amount of lemon juice or mustard
3. Switch out the chef salad seasoning for any other seasoning
4. Omit the seasoning, add 1/2 tsp Kosher Salt and add any combination of the following:
   • Chopped shallots
   • Chopped garlic
   • Chopped red onion
   • Grated parmesan cheese
   • Crumbled feta cheese
   • Chopped parsley
   • Chopped/Dried oregano
5. Want it creamy? Blend it with some mayonnaise, sour cream, or for a healthier twist – Greek Yogurt 😉