italian dressing

Welcome back. I'm here again with another exclusive recipe. Today, we're going to embark on a trip to Italy for some fresh Mediterranean flavor in the form of a delicious, Italian-inspired salad dressing.

Growing up, my family and I would eat a lot at a restaurant called Bravo!. For those of you who have never heard of this place, Bravo! is basically The Olive Garden for Italian-Americans who think they're too good to eat at The Olive Garden. When I was younger I would usually just order something deep-fried and/or covered in cheese, but as I began to mature as a woman I really took a liking to their selection of salads, SPECIFICALLY their rendition of the classic Italian chopped garden salad with red wine vinaigrette. This salad haunts me. I live in California now and have NEVER seen a brick and mortar Bravo!, in Los Angeles or otherwise. The salad itself is standard fare, but the vinaigrette just takes this thing to a whole 'nother level. I think about this dressing constantly. I'm now taking this sick craving and imposing it on you.

Now, obviously, like any Italian, I know how to throw a fucking red wine vinaigrette together. But on my own, I've never been able to reverse-engineer the delicate flavor profile the big boys at Bravo! achieve with theirs. So, I took to the internet and did a little research. This recipe courtesy of Deanna's Corner Cooking is the closest to the original I could find. The following is a rendition of her delicious formula, with a few slight modifications on my part.

This shit is really going to spice up lunchtime at the office, I guarantee it.

Before we begin, let's discuss our vessel: an empty bottle of grey poupon mustard (washed). This gives the dressing that classy, store-bought feel, while still remaining true to our financial and dietary goals. I used to use a glass jar but pouring it from a threaded lip usually gets messy and ends up being more trouble than its worth, doubly so when you want to bring this into work for the week and are constructing your salads on the fly. Things just end up better this way, trust me.

Onward, to the ingredients:

1/2 cup of olive oil

2/3 cup of red wine vinegar

one clove of pressed garlic

one tablespoon of dijon mustard

two tablespoons of honey

one and a half tablespoons of an italian herb blend

(store-bought or homemade; mine consists of oregano,

marjoram, thyme, rosemary, basil, and sage)

one tablespoon of salt

one teaspoon of pepper

I have my two most voluminous liquid ingredients, the olive oil and the vinegar, combined together in a measuring cup for easy pouring; those who don't spend much time in the kitchen will notice that they separate quickly after mixing. There are a lot of scientific reasons for this that I'm not going to burden you with at this time. I'm only pointing it out so nobody thinks something has gone terribly wrong. They're just not going to get along. It's okay. Add the honey in a similar fashion.

Next, we're going to toss that lump of mustard into the mix. The mustard serves the purpose of helping the dressing emulsify after being shaken.

It's a little tricky doing it this way, and just so I don't look like a total moron, this scoop didn't come from the bottle we're using here. In retrospect it probably would have been helpful to dissolve it in some of the red wine vinegar to make it pourable. You live and you learn.

Next, we're going to get that garlic in there. You're going to need a garlic press. This is imperative. You want this garlic to be mashed. Mincing it even very finely will not only cut down the garlic's potency but also give you and anybody else eating this dressing the unfortunate experience of chomping down on raw little garlic bombs throughout the course of the meal. If you don't own a garlic press, buy one. It's an investment you will not regret.

The next step has the potential to be just as tricky as getting the mustard through the narrow mouth of the bottle, but luckily for you I've devised a system to aid in this endeavor. Close your eyes and imagine for a second dumping that little bowl of sprinkles into the bottle; if your sense of disaster is as keen as mine, you've probably just covered your countertop in a fragrant layer of crumbs. This is not ideal. So, as a solution, I went into my art bin and grabbed a small paper card to dump the herbs on.

It kind of looks like I'm rolling a joint, but I'm not. I'm making salad dressing. The paper card allows us to sort of funnel the mixture into the bottle. I probably could have just used a real funnel, but I didn't, and I got the job done anyway.

Alright. Everybody's in the pool. Now there's only one thing left to do, and that's shake it.

Oh, fuck yes. It looks just like the real thing. You're going to want to give this sucker a good shake before each use to ensure maximum flavor distribution. Other than that, you're ready to go.

I think some people say it's a bad idea to keep homemade dressing around in the fridge for more than a week, but if I'm being totally honest I've never had a bottle last that long. It's all a matter of lifestyle, I guess.