How to Make 3 Easy Herbal Salad Dressings

Spring has definitely arrived. I find myself reaching for more green in my meals. Fresh salads, steamed greens, raw veggie plates. I love them all, but honestly… it’s all about the dressing! Ya know?!

Green salads are good, but green salads splashed with big herbal flavor are better.

For more than salad

Yummy herbal dressings brighten up almost any savory dish: steamed greens, baked root vegetables, quinoa salad, tuna fish sandwiches, scrambled eggs…

At the beginning of each week I make up a few salad dressings for my family. The ingredients are never the same; it all depends on what is most alive in the garden. These dressings make their way onto something we eat just about every day.

I think of them as more than just dressings, though. They are flavor and medicine for the week. Not only do they add seasoning to our food, but they add a dollop of green medicine to every meal.

Easy on the budget

Oh, and did I mention how making your own dressings is not only good for your health, but also your pocketbook?

Herbal salad dressings offer more than a big dash of yum, they save you money. Next time you find yourself walking down the grocery store aisle, take a look at the price of the herbal salad dressings.

While you are at it, you might notice that the expensive “organic” salad dressings also have questionable ingredients in them! Fresh homemade salad dressings are a great way to go easy on your budget and get an extra added dose of medicinal herbs into your food.

Let’s get started and make our dressings for the week!

Herby Spring Salad Dressing

Today my garden offered up wild radish flower, wild mustard leaf and flower, plantain, miner’s lettuce and wood sorrel for this seasonal salad dressing. Make sure you have 100% accurate identification of your wild weeds and see what you’ve got in your yard. Gather up about 1/4 cup of spring weeds to make this dressing.

What you’ll need…

• 3/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup white wine vinegar or apple cider vinegar
• 1/4 cup fresh edible spring herbs (My dressing has: radish flowers, mustard leaf and flower, plantain, miner’s lettuce and wood sorrel)

Mince the herbs and add them to the vinegar and oil. OK, this is easy, right?!

Creamy Chive Salad Dressing

The chives are going crazy in my yard right now. Every year the garden does something a little different. The conditions are just right for one thing to thrive one year but not the next. Well, I can say that I think this is going to be a chive year. They were the first thing to come back and my plants doubled in size. Looking forward to lots of chive dressings.

Chives are full of vitamins A and C and are a powerful antioxidant. They are in the same family as onions and they add a peppery, onion zing flavor that can liven up a potato salad, cucumber salad or coleslaw

What you’ll need…

• 3 tablespoons olive oil
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice
• 1/2 teaspoon water
• 1 large clove garlic
• 1/2 cup chopped chives
• 1/8 teaspoon sea salt
• 1/2 cup whole, plain yogurt

First blend the olive oil, lemon juice, water, garlic, chives and sea salt together in a blender.

Once everything is mixed together, add the yogurt and give it another whirl.

I use an Osterizer blender. The bottom fitment of the Osterizer pitcher fits on a regular size Mason jar, so this is usually how I blend my dressings. However, you can use any blender that you have on hand.

Rosemary Blossom Balsamic Dressing

Whatever seems to be humming with the most life is what goes into the dressings. Right now the rosemary hedge is in full bloom. The bees are loving the rosemary, but there are enough flowers to go around, so rosemary is on the menu!

Rosemary’s carminative action will help you more effectively digest any food you add it to. Rosemary is also known for enhancing memory, so get it onto your plate!

This dressing goes really well with beet salad and asparagus. I am getting hungry…

What you’ll need…

• 3 tablespoons sunflower seeds
• 3/4 cup olive oil
• 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar
• 3 tablespoons rosemary blossoms and leaves
• 1/4 teaspoon sea salt

Put the sunflower seeds in the blender and powder them up. Then add everything else and blend until you have a nice creamy consistency.

How to store herbal salad dressings

These fresh, delicious, healthy salad dressings last in the fridge for about a week. They might have a little longer than 1-week shelf life, but they taste so good, sometimes they don’t even last a week…

Shake up your dressings before you use them. If you need them right after you make them, that is fine, but what I’ve noticed is that if you let the dressing sit for a few hours, the flavors blend together and they taste a little better.

Have fun transforming your food with your yummy herbal dressings.