Cranberry Salad Dressing

Recipe: Cranberry Salad Dressing

This pretty pink creamy  Cranberry Salad Dressing is perfect for the Holiday Meal. With tangy and sweetish taste, it pairs well with a fruity salad. And the best part of making this salad dressing is that you can use your leftover cranberry sauce. Or make some more cranberry sauce so you can use it to make the salad dressing.

 

A First For Me

While I’ve had several opportunities to enjoy dried cranberries – in salads, bakes, granola, energy bites, had not tried fresh cranberries till I came to Canada. Our first winter 2021, I got excited when I saw fresh cranberries. Bought a packet, tried one and it was soooo tangy. I used a generous to bake Orange Cranberry Muffins and Cake. But had some leftover. Every day I ate a couple as I don’t mind the tangy taste.

This year, forgetful hubby came back from shopping with a bagful of cranberries, thinking he can add them to his oats as they are. Now he is doesn’t like tangy food that much. Again baked an Orange Cranberry Loaf.  When my son and his girlfriend came down for Christmas, I asked her what else we can use the cranberries for. She replied cranberry sauce or jelly. The package itself had the cranberry sauce recipe.

So I made the cranberry sauce. We used some for our baked brie…and it tasted sooo good. The remaining I used up for the dressing. Perfect! Then I went and bought another bag and hubby is giving me that look and thinking “why did she buy another bag of cranberries? Is she going to make more sauce?” Well, I used them to make Indian style pickle. And soon the recipe will be on my blog.

 

Sharing This Recipe With Sunday Funday Group

This weekend we’re making Salad Dressings from scratch as Sue suggested. I was thinking of making strawberry vinaigrette to go with the pear and brie salad I was planning for our New Year Dinner. When I made the cranberry sauce, I knew it was too much for the baked brie. So I googled “how to use up leftover cranberry sauce.” And so many suggestions came up – muffins, bars, meatballs, serve with chicken, make jello dessert, cheesecake, thumbprint cookies filling, smoothie and a dressing. Yippee, dressing sounds awesome. So shelved the idea of strawberry vinaigrette and made cranberry salad dressing with leftover cranberry sauce.

I paired Cranberry Salad Dressing with Pear And Brie Salad and it was a hit with my guests. I often make the salad and pair it with other dressings, homemade or ready made. But by far, this dressing was a complete game changer. Almost like serving a salad in a 5 star restaurant.

Cranberry Salad Dressing

With most recipes that I tend to Google, I check out several. Pick from each what I feel will work for me. Some called for quite a bit of sugar and the sauce already has some. Others had more vinegar. This salad dressing recipe is a keeper and will be making some again during the holiday season. I added a bit more olive oil to the remaining dressing so that I could keep it a bit longer for other salads.

 

Salad Dressings

The most important thing about salad dressings is to get the salt, acid and fat in a proper balance.  Basically, there are two main kinds of salad dressings – vinaigrette and creamy dressings. Vinaigrette tend to be slightly more acidic and are pourable. Creamy ones tend to be with more fat and viscous.

 

Some Salad Dressings You May Like

 

 

Salad Dressings Prepared By Members Of Sunday Funday

 

Palatable Pastime: Blue Cheese Salad Dressing
Mayuri’s Jikoni: Cranberry Salad Dressing
A Day in the Life on the Farm: Homemade Celery Seed Dressing
Sneha’s Recipe: Keto Vegan Passion Fruit Sour Cream Dressing
Amy’s Cooking Adventures: Chicken Caesar Salads with Homemade Caesar Dressing
Bloggetti: Easy Homemade Greek Salad Dressing
Sid’s Sea Palm Cooking: Old-Fashioned Cream Dressing for Salads
Culinary Cam: Basic Vinaigrette and Variations

Ingredient Required For Cranberry Salad Dressing

Cranberry Sauce

I made the cranberry sauce at home. It is pretty easy. For every cup of fresh cranberries you add ¼ cup sugar and ¼ cup of orange juice or water. Add the liquid and sugar in a pan and heat it. Stir till the sugar melts. Add the cranberries. Allow the mixture to cook till the cranberries begin to pop. The liquid will have become thicker. Take the pan off the heat. Mash the cranberries a bit if you want to. On cooling the sauce will thicken, I have not used ready made sauce so am not sure how it would taste in the salad dressing. If you have tried let please let me know.

Vinegar

Use good quality red wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar. I have used balsamic vinegar.

Sweetener

As the sauce is a bit sweet, I added little maple syrup. You can add honey, brown sugar or white sugar.

Oil Olive

Good quality olive oil. Add more if you want the dressing to stay fresh for a few more days.

Dijon Mustard

Goes so well with cranberries, so add some.

Salt

Add according to your taste. I have used normal table salt.  Can use sea salt, Himalayan Pink Salt.

Black Pepper

Freshly cracked pepper adds more flavour.

 

 

 

 

Watch How To Make Pear Brie Salad And Cranberry Salad Dressing

 

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