Don't Leave Your Salad Undressed

Let's make salad dressing!

Yeah, yeah, I know what you're thinking: why would anyone ever make their own salad dressing, from scratch, when there's an entire wall full of pre-made dressings available in your local supermarket? Especially when some of these salad dressings are not only tasty, but also are labeled with a lifelike representation of Paul Newman's face?!

Well, what if I told you that making your own salad dressing is proven to lengthen your lifespan, improve your sex appeal, and increase your chances of getting into college? There! Not so smug now, are we?!

But really, your salad needs dressing. And making your own sounds complicated and artisanal, even though it isn't; it will earn you major cred for craftsmanship, and suddenly, you will be considered to be in the same league as people who butcher their own pork, sew their own clothes, or make their own furniture from scratch. Plus, with the holidays around the corner, there's no doubt that you'll be roped into some sort of culinary duty or another—and if you volunteer to make the salad, nobody will be able to assign you other, less-pleasant tasks, such as snapping the ends off beans, peeling the potatoes, or sticking your hand up the turkey's how-do-you-do to retrieve the gift-wrapped package of icky innards.

Are you convinced? YES YOU ARE. And now, let's make a salad!

If you ever eat at a French restaurant, you'll probably be served some version of this very simple, very palate-piquing side dish. Don't be fooled by the lack of vegetables other than lettuce; this salad doesn't need friends, okay? It does just fine on its own, thankyouverymuch.

INGREDIENTS
Two heads (or bags) leafy green lettuce
2 tbsp cup red wine vinegar
1 tbsp Dijon mustard (such as Grey Poupon)
1/2 tsp salt
fresh ground black pepper
2-3 cloves garlic, minced
1/4 cup olive oil

DIRECTIONS
1. Tear the lettuce into bite-sized pieces. Put the pieces into the salad bowl. Tell them to wait, and behave.

2. Crush and mince the garlic cloves. (You can crush your garlic with the broadest part of a chef's knife blade, but it's a lot more fun to just put the garlic on a sturdy surface, such as a cutting board, and then beat it into submission with a cast-iron frying pan.) Minced garlic should be cut into teeny, tiny pieces—no bigger than half the size of a grain of rice. If you're nervous about cutting, you can use a garlic press to do the scary work for you.

3. In a medium-sized bowl, combine the vinegar, mustard, salt, pepper and garlic. Stir with a whisk until it's all combined, then pour the olive oil into the bowl in a thin stream, whisking the mixture at the same time. This will cause it to emulsify, so that the oil and vinegar will happily coexist together without getting into a dinner-ruining argument.

4. Dip a pinky into the bowl and taste your dressing. Add more salt and pepper if needed. Then pour it over your salad and toss.

Do you make your own dressing?

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