Friday, April 29, 2011

Friday Favorites Return: Make Your Own Ranch

A few weeks ago I got a big craving for oven baked chicken fingers dipped in creamy ranch dressing. Healthy, I know...

Anyway, I bought this expensive bottle of ranch dressing from the refrigerated section that boasted is was made with only a few ingredients. On closer inspection, it still had ingredients I've been avoiding. Still, better than nothing right? So I took it home, made my chicken fingers and was thankful I had the dressing because frankly, they were bland.

Last night, I tried my hand at chicken tenders again. This time I tried to directly emulate my mother-in-law's method. Apparently I need to watch her more closely because again: bland. This time, I had no ranch dressing, and you can bet with gas prices at one arm and two legs I was not going to take a jaunt out to get some.

I'd seen a recipe for buttermilk ranch on one of my favorite blogs, but assumed it was be too difficult to be worth the effort, but desperate times call for desperate measures.

To my (and David's) surprise, not only was the ranch easy to make, it was the best ranch dressing I've ever had. It would actually be perfect as a veggie dip since it's so thick and creamy. Best of all, it far out-shined the expensive bottle of store dressing at a fraction of the cost.

So, without further ado, here's the link to making your own amazing buttermilk ranch dressing. Oh, and if you're like me and never have buttermilk on hand, here are a couple substitutions:

1/2 plain yogurt, 1/2 milk (this is the one I use all the time)

1 tblspn white vinegar or lemon juice and enough milk to equal one cup


I also omitted the fresh parsley, as I had none.

The work station

The finished product

2 comments:

Stephanie Cunningham said...

Oh my gracious...this comes at a PERFECT time..thanks for posting this! We just got back from vacation...which means eating too much McDonalds since we were in a country that had one (and a Burger King, and a KFC, and a TGIFridays, and a Subway....you get the idea). On the way home last night I was thinking I needed to find a ranch recipe so we can eat more salads this week to kind of detox a bit. So glad I didn't have to search and I found one from a friend...woo! Thanks for sharing!

Jessica said...

Mmm that sounds delicious! Thanks for posting the buttermilk tip!