Mellow Maple-Miso Salad Dressing

This year, I have used summer’s abundant produce as an excuse to fit a jumbo salad into our daily diets and to experiment with homemade salad dressings and vinaigrettes. But, with busier days on the horizon, I realized that I must taper off my ritual of experimenation, where I whip up single servings regularly, and choose a few dressings to bottle in larger quantities for some time savings.

I am pretty sure that the Sweet Dijon Dressing  will be one of the options, however, I had yet to successfully create a dressing that would satisfy my husband’s greatest craving. He could practically live off of a sesame-soy dressing. It sounds simple enough, but the at-home blends just weren’t working for me until I came up with this gem. The salty miso and soy sauce are tempered nicely with a bit of maple syrup. Plus, using just a touch of sesame oil adds a nice well rounded flavor, but keeps the overall dressing very low in fat.

My husband agreed that this one is really good, and though quite different from his usual oil-laden, store-bought version, he is happy to make the transition …

Mellow Maple-Miso Salad Dressing

This recipe is Vegan, Dairy-Free, Egg-Free, Nut-Free, Low-Fat, Free of Refined Sugars, and optionally Gluten-Free.

Every miso dressing recipe I try is either too bland, too salty, or just somehow off, but this blend hit my taste buds just right. See my notes that follow the recipe for some tips on the ingredients used.

• 1/4 Cup Mellow Miso (such as a mild white soy miso or a barley miso)
• 1/4 Cup + 2 Teaspoons Rice Vinegar
• 1/4 Cup Soy Sauce or Wheat-Free Tamari (for gluten-free)
• 2 Tablespoons Maple Syrup
• 2 Teaspoons Sesame Oil
• 1/2 Teaspoon Ground Ginger Powder

Place all ingredients in a bowl, and whisk until smooth. Alternately, you can place the ingredients in a blender and quickly puree until smooth.

Yields roughly 3/4 cup

Ingredient Notes:

Ginger  and Garlic are two of my favorite ingredients, but you may have noticed that most of my salad dressing recipes call for the ground / powdered form rather than fresh varieties. There are several reasons for this. One is that my husband can’t take the pungency of fresh (raw) garlic and ginger. Another is that I tend to whip up salad dressings on the fly, and like recipes that require no chopping, just measure and mix. Finally, I don’t always have the fresh stuff on hand! If you prefer to use fresh, go for it. I think about 1 T of fresh minced or crushed ginger should work nicely.

Maple Syrup is such a precious commodity these days, so I rarely use more than a couple of tablespoons in a recipe, which is really all you need to get its full flavor benefit. Since you are using just a bit, don’t skimp, buy pure maple syrup, not imitation!

Miso is sold in the refrigerated section. It is readily available in natural food stores and Asian markets, but these days you can probably even locate it in the mega-marts. It will range in price, but I usually go for one of the less expensive versions for around $3 to $4 a tub. The one I used is soy-based, but for a similar taste, you can choose barley miso or chickpea miso, which is a bit sweeter.

Blog Events: I am submitting this recipe for Souper (or soup, salad, and sammies) Sundays.

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5 Good Things Since My Last Post

1. I cleaned up and organized all of the photos on my computer, at last.
2. We saw the new Harry Potter movie yesterday; those are always so much fun.
3. We finally figured out how to get the cat from sleeping on my pillow above my head at night (since she frequently gets up, charges over my husband, and meows whenever she comes back!).
4. I just finished a wonderfully delicious bowl of homemade chicken and barley soup. I guess we already have fall on the brain!
5. We had a wonderful “cool” spell of weather, allowing us to go for a mid-summer hike in the southwest.