Salad Dressing Basics
Cook to Cook
Lighter dishes, such as seafood, white meats, some vegetarian, and pasta, are often best with oil-based dressing. Richer meats can hold their own against richer dressings.
Salad dressings, of course, come in a huge range of flavors and prices. Ready right out of the bottle, they are an essential for the weeknight salad. Different types of dressings are appropriate for different meals. Popular varieties include the following:
- Oil dressings, including vinegar and oil, Italian, and others
- Rich dressings, including ranch, thousand island, Russian, and others
- Cheese dressings, with names like blue cheese, Parmesan, cracked pepper, and so on
Think about the dressing you choose in the context of your main dish. If you're serving a light fish dish, for example, consider a salad with oil dressing rather than potentially overwhelming blue cheese.
Excerpted from The Complete Idiot's Guide to 20-Minute Meals © 2003 by CWL Publishing Enterprises, Inc., John Woods, President. All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. Used by arrangement with Alpha Books, a member of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.
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