While on vacation last week, we slouched about quite a few shops, galleries, restaurants, wineries, and farm stands.
At one place (winery, farm stand, can’t recall at this point – hmmm – mebbe it was a winery), our friends picked up a bottle of Vidalia onion poppy seed dressing to go with our salad that night with grilled steaks for dinner at the cabin. And it was really very good.
Which got me to looking at the label…
Hmmm.
“Made for, ermmm, so-and-so” and, well, heck, there’s corn sweeteners in that there jar of dressing! (I am not a fan of the corn sweetners).
So, I got to thinking: “I might could make my own sweet onion and poppy seed dressing, without the unwanted sweeteners and stuff,” and set to work.
It turns out, all you need is a sweet onion, a blender, a few spices, some vinegar, and oil.
Oh, and a bit of inspiration, so, thanks to the very nice folk at Sanford House for their salad dressing, which I used as a jumping off point to make this one.
INGREDIENTS
•1/4 cup sugar
•2 tbsp honey
•1 tsp celery seed
•1 tsp salt
•1 tsp dry mustard
•1 tsp paprika
•1 small sweet onion, diced (~1-1/2 cup)
•1/4 cup red wine vinegar
•1 cup safflower oil
•2 tbsp poppy seeds
Add the sugar, honey, celery seed, salt, mustard, and paprika to a blender jar and top with the diced sweet onion and red wine vinegar. Blend until the onion is puréed and the mixture is smooth.
With the blender running, slowly drizzle the oil through the hole in the lid until it is absorbed into the dressing.
Add the poppy seeds and pulse to blend, then transfer to a covered jar and stash in the fridge until needed.
Nice dressing! Sweet, but not too, too sweet.
As usual when I make a salad dressing, I had cut the amount of sugar used in half from the Sanford House’s original recipe; but this time, recalling that jarred dressing, I added two tablespoons of honey to reinforce the sweetness. It is not as red as the Vidalia poppy seed dressings you see on store shelves, but it’s still pretty darned good on a garden salad and, I’m thinkin’, it is just sweet and onion-y enough to be pretty darned spectacular on a baby spinach and strawberry salad. Good thing I’m going to the market today, I have some spinach to pick up…