My Ranch Recipe....

By popular request.... :)

Homemade Ranch Dressing

1 cup mayo (the real thing, not miracle whip, low fat, etc)
1 cup buttermilk
1 tsp. parsley flakes
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. coarse ground black pepper
1/2 tsp. MSG (Accent -- this concerns some folks, and it can be omitted)
1/4 tsp. garlic/herb mix or just garlic powder (I just happen to have a humongous bottle of garlic with herbs from Costco)
1/4 tsp. onion powder (I prefer to use a tbsp. dried onions, also from a humongous bottle from Costco!)
1/2 tsp. dillweed

Mix all with a whisk in large mixing bowl, and store in fridge. (If you use onion powder, you could use it right away, but the dried onions need a couple hours to reconstitute which also serves to thicken the dressing just slightly).

Now, the above recipe is my own variation of a pile of recipes I collected off the internet... And I never make a batch this small!!

I get a 32 ounce jar of mayonaise, and a quart of buttermilk, and adjust all of the spices up accordingly (x 4). And for the dillweed, I absolutely REFUSE to pay the $7.00 a bottle pricetag on the little bottle in the spice aisle at the grocery store here. So, I went to Henry's, a market here that sells spices in the bulk aisle. I got a plastic bag and put a huge scoop of dried dillweed in it, for about a buck. I refilled the store-bought brand-name bottle three times from it!

Another alternative, before I found the bulk spices, was to purchase fresh dill in the produce department. A container of fresh dill cost me about $2.00 and when dehydrated in my dehydrator, and then crushed, nearly refilled the brand-name spice bottle.

I make so much of this stuff it's not funny! It keeps a long time. I saved my store-bought dressing bottles, and use a bottle brush to wash them, etc... soaked off the labels and then filled them with my own version of Ranch!

I am sure that you could make a reduced fat version of this easily enough, but this version is lower carb and that is helpful to me. I don't eat huge quantities of it at any one time, but I do use it pretty often! I started making it when Patrick was living with us, because there was never a time that boy filled a plate at our house that he didn't also plop a puddle of ranch onto it! He ate Ranch with EVERYTHING. Even with his Thanksgiving dinner plate!! I made this and he loved it! I figured that was high praise from someone who included Ranch Dressing as a food group in his eating plan!

Enjoy!! :)