Yogurt Lemon Salad Dressing

Yogurt Marinade and Yogurt-Lemon Dressing

It all started when I began eating more real foods and less junk (processed "foods"). Yogurt is one of those probiotic-rich foods that I added in my homemade arsenals. I buy the plain nonfat or 1.5% fat yogurt (Stonyfield) from time to time as my culture starter, then I make several batches using whole raw milk (which I get for free).  It's so easy to make when you have a dehydrator that doubles as low-heat oven.  In my search to eliminate store-bought dressings, and in wanting to use up the sour plain yogurt (homemade, which I could not eat by itself until I realized it tasted like mild vinegar), a light bulb went off in my head and I searched for a recipe for a dressing that uses yogurt.


This one is my go-to dressing now. I got it from the internet (allrecipes, I believe).  And while I have been using this for months on my salads, my son#1 only tried it last Saturday when I brought it (along with other store-bought dressings) to my BIL's birthday (we were instructed to bring our own because they only had blue cheese).  My son#1 got hooked and requested that I get more salads so he could have it again.  And so we did last night, with him making the dressing because we only had a small amount of the remaining batch.

I do make my yogurt now Greek-style (whey drained from it) so our dressing is thicker, and I prefer the use of expeller-pressed coconut oil (EPCO) instead of olive oil (I still have EVOO in my kitchen), as it is yummy yet does not have a coconut-y taste.

This dressing was adapted from epicurious. I followed everything except I added more herbs from my garden and I used EVOO instead of avocado or canola oil. I am not ever going to use con-ola oil.

My plate of salad greens
with yogurt dressing
and yogurt-marinated
salmon

YOGURT-LEMON SALAD DRESSING

• 1 cup plain whole-milk yogurt
• 1/3 cup chopped fresh Italian parsley
• 1 tsp basil (optional)
• 1 tsp chives, snipped (optional)
• 1/4 cup EVOO, or VCO or EPCO
• 1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
• 1 garlic clove, pressed
• Fine sea salt to taste

This is so wonderful on salads!
By this time, I have made countless batches of this dressing. Perfect replacement for the starch-laden vinegary (not good in fighting Candida) and sugary dressings available in the supermarkets, which uses the most unhealthy oils from highly processed soybean or canola.

I would like to thank my friend, Cecilia, for her birthday gift for me last year, the Microplane Herb Mill, which I use a lot for this purpose.