What to Put in a Salad: Elevate Your Salad with Game-changing Dressings

Salad isn’t typically a preferred choice, but rather something we force ourselves to eat. We know it’s good for us, so we forgo the beef burger and chips and opt reluctantly for the caesar salad.

In a restaurant context, that’s not necessarily a bad thing. The typical salad that you’re served when eating out generally tastes pretty good.

But when you’re cooking at home, it’s a different story. For most people, home-made salads are a sad state of affairs. People generally struggle with what to put in a salad. They’re usually a bland mix of half-heartedly prepared iceberg lettuce, tomato and cucumber served dry.

I’ve eaten salads served without even salt on occasion. Is it any wonder that people are more likely to opt for the beef burger?

It doesn’t have to be like this — salads at home can taste just as good as those that you’re served in the restaurant.

Understanding what to put in a salad is key to achieving that restaurant-like taste. When you’re pondering what to put in a salad, use more inspiring consider adding texture with nuts, seeds, or croutons for an extra crunch, and actually season the salad.

But in my opinion, the quickest way to transform a sad salad into something delicious is by making a salad dressing that you actually like. But the question remains, what to put in a salad dressing to make it truly stand out? And what kind of salad dressing should you make?

In the world of salad dressings, the vinaigrette is king.

What is a vinaigrette?

At its most basic, a vinaigrette is a salad dressing made from oil, acid (usually vinegar) and mustard. The oil and acidity are for taste, while the mustard is an emulsifier.

I’ve wrote about emulsions before, but simply put: fat and water do not mix. If you try to mix together oil and vinegar, they will quickly separate. The oil will sit on the top, and the vinegar will retreat to the bottom. But mustard can “connect” these two liquids to form a creamy dressing. That’s why mustard is an essential part of many salad dressings, including the traditional vinaigrette.

The ratios for a traditional vinaigrette are 3 parts oil to 1 part vinegar (or citric acid, such as that from a lemon or lime) and a small amount of mustard.

Anyway — that’s the basic components of a traditional vinaigrette, but we can take things a step further to really up your salad game.

What to put in a salad: how to “level-up” a vinaigrette

For one thing, mustard isn’t the only emulsifier available. You could technically replace the mustard with eggs, tomato paste, honey or any number of other emulsifiers. Honey is a really nice choice if you want to make a sweet vinaigrette.

But the emulsifier is only used in small proportions to the oil and the vinegar, so these ingredients, though they have a strong flavour on their own, they won’t be massively prominent in the vinaigrette.

What will determine the prominent flavours are the acid and fat components.

As already mentioned, vinegar is the acid used in the traditional vinaigrette. And that alone gives you a lot of choice: apple cider vinegar, rice vinegar, red or white wine vinegar or even balsamic. But you could also opt for other acidic ingredients, such as the juice from a lemon, lime or even an orange or grapefruit.

And an oil like olive oil is the fat typically used in a vinaigrette, which can be switched up. There are so many flavourful oils available, such as sesame oil or, for the brave hearted amongst you, chilli oil or truffle oil. I’d recommend avoiding any neutral oils, like vegetable oil, because although they help make the dressing creamy, they don’t add any flavour.

To make the vinaigrette, you’ll need something to mix it in. I’m using a specific salad dressing mixer, but a simple bowl and a fork will do. Measure out three parts fat, one part acid and a small amount of your emulsifier. You’ll also want to add salt to taste enhance the flavour.

Now that we’ve created a basic vinaigrette we can start to get creative. You can consider this dressing as a base for adding extra flavours. The beauty of the vinaigrette is in its flexibility.

Want a creamy dressing? No problem. Just add some yogurt or mayo. Want some sweetness? Fine. Just add sugar, sweetener, maple syrup, or honey. What about spice? That’s fine as well. You can throw in some cayenne pepper, some smoked paprika, maybe some fresh chilies if you’ve got them. Whole spices, like cumin and fennel seeds, work pretty well as well. If you’ve got some fresh herbs on hand, like coriander, you can throw that in as well.

There’s no hard and fast rules here. Once you’ve got that base vinaigrette of fat, acid and the emulsifier you can experiment with whatever flavours and add-ons you want.

Just remember to taste and adjust as needed. And here’s another tip for you. If you want to taste the dressing, apply a little bit to a leaf from the salad that you’re going to create and taste it that way. That’s how you’re going to eat it, right? You want to taste it in context. If you do taste the dressing directly, it’ll taste way too strong.

One extra point here: do not forget to add salt. Salt is, in my opinion, the most important ingredient in your dressing. Without it, the dressing will taste flat. To season the dressing properly, mix everything together, add salt, wait a minute or two, then taste and adjust as needed.

You need to wait because salt does not dissolve in fat. It can only dissolve in water. Since the dressing is mainly fat, you’ll have to be patient and give the salt time to dissolve and distribute. You could season the vinegar (which is the water component of your dressing) before adding it, but you can’t be certain it’s the right amount of salt. My advice is to be patient.

And here’s some more great news: vinaigrettes aren’t just for salads. They make great marinades, too. You can soak it into your protein, whether it’s chicken, beef, tofu or whatever, and leave it in the fridge overnight. Or, you can use it for coating vegetables before you roast them.

Now that you know what to put in a salad, let’s make a salad dressing.

Universal vinaigrette recipe

Ingredients

• Flavourful oil: e.g extra virgin olive oil, sesame oil or chilli oil
• Acid: e.g red wine vinegar, apple cider vinegar or lemon juice
• Emulsifier : e.g mustard, tomato puree, egg yolks
• Salt to taste
• Additional ingredients: sweeteners (e.g. honey, maple syrup), fat (e.g Greek yoghurt, mayo), spices (e.g. black pepper, cumin, turmeric, chives) or aromatics (e.g. spring onions, garlic, chilli)

Directions

• Combine all the ingredients in a salad dressing mixer and shake vigorously, or use a whisk in a bowl.
• Season to taste. Taste by dipping a salad leaf from your salad into the dressing, then eating the salad leaf (the dressing flavours are too strong to taste directly, and when tasted directly are not indicative of how it will taste in context of the salad).
• Adjust taste as needed, then serve.