Salad dressing
A salad dressing is a sauce for salads, a condiment used on virtually all leafy salads. Dressings may also be used in preparing salads of beans, noodle or pasta salads and antipasti, and forms of potato salad. A dressing may even be made for fruit salads. Salad dressings can be drizzled over a salad, added and tossed with the ingredients, or offered "on the side". The functionality of some of these sauces has been extended, meaning they can be served as a dip.
Types
In Western culture, there are two basic types of salad dressing:- Vinaigrettes based on a mixture of olive or salad oil and vinegar, and variously flavored with herbs, spices, salt, pepper, sugar, and other ingredients, such as poppy seeds or ground Parmesan cheese.
- Creamy dressings, usually based on mayonnaise or fermented milk products, such as yogurt, sour cream or buttermilk.