Blue cheese dressing is a popular side

sauce In cooking, a sauce is a liquid, cream, or semi- solid food, served on or used in preparing other foods. Most sauces are not normally consumed by themselves; they add flavour, texture, and visual appeal to a dish. ''Sauce'' is a French wor ...

salad dressing A salad dressing is a sauce for salads, used on virtually all leafy salads. Dressings may also be used in preparing salads of beans (e.g., three bean salad), noodle or pasta salads and antipasti, and forms of potato salad. A dressing may even ...

and dip in the United States and Canada. It is usually made of some combination of blue cheese,

mayonnaise Mayonnaise (), colloquially referred to as "mayo" (), is a thick, creamy sauce with a rich and tangy taste that is commonly used on sandwiches, hamburgers, Salad#Bound salads, bound salads, and French fries. It also forms the base for various o ...

, and

buttermilk Buttermilk is a fermented dairy drink. Traditionally, it was the liquid left behind after churning butter out of cultured cream. As most modern butter in Western countries is not made with cultured cream but uncultured sweet cream, most mode ...

sour cream Sour cream (sometimes known as soured cream in British English) is a dairy product obtained by fermenting regular cream with certain kinds of lactic acid bacteria. The bacterial culture, which is introduced either deliberately or naturall ...

yogurt Yogurt (; , from , ; also spelled yoghurt, yogourt or yoghourt) is a food produced by bacterial Fermentation (food), fermentation of milk. Fermentation of sugars in the milk by these bacteria produces lactic acid, which acts on milk protein to ...

milk Milk is a white liquid food produced by the mammary glands of lactating mammals. It is the primary source of nutrition for young mammals (including breastfeeding, breastfed human infants) before they are able to digestion, digest solid food. ...

vinegar Vinegar () is an aqueous solution of diluted acetic acid and trace compounds that may include flavorings. Vinegar typically contains from 5% to 18% acetic acid by volume. Usually, the acetic acid is produced by a double fermentation, converting ...

onion powder Onion powder is Drying (food), dehydrated, ground onion used as a seasoning. It is a common ingredient in seasoned salt and spice mixes, such as beau monde seasoning. Some varieties are prepared using toasted onion. White, yellow, and red onions m ...

, and garlic powder. There is a blue cheese vinaigrette that consists of salad oil, blue cheese, vinegar, and sometimes seasonings. Most major salad dressing producers and restaurants in the United States and Canada produce a variant of blue cheese dressing. It is commonly served as a dip with Buffalo wings or

crudités Crudités (, ) are French appetizers consisting of sliced or whole raw vegetables which are typically dipped in a vinaigrette or other dipping sauce. Examples of crudités include celery sticks, carrot sticks, cucumber sticks, bell pepper strip ...

(raw

vegetable Vegetables are edible parts of plants that are consumed by humans or other animals as food. This original meaning is still commonly used, and is applied to plants collectively to refer to all edible plant matter, including edible flower, flo ...

s).

Culinary uses

In addition to being used as a salad dressing, blue cheese dressing pairs well with a number of ingredients like chicken, turkey, garlic bread, and corn. It can be used as a dressing for

sandwiches A sandwich is a dish typically consisting variously of meat, cheese, sauces, and vegetables used as a filling between slices of bread, or placed atop a slice of bread; or, more generally, any dish in which bread serves as a ''container'' or ...

or wraps or incorporated in dips with other ingredients like

cream cheese Cream cheese is a soft, usually mild-tasting fresh cheese made from milk and cream.Oxford English Dictionary Cream cheese is not naturally matured and is meant to be consumed fresh, so it differs from other soft cheeses such as Brie and Neuf ...

, and

hot sauce Hot sauce is a type of condiment, seasoning, or salsa (sauce), salsa made from chili peppers and other ingredients. Many commercial varieties of Mass production, mass-produced hot sauce exist. History Humans have used chili peppers and other ho ...

Safety and storage

Separation of water and oil (instability of the emulsion) is a potential problem with blue cheese dressing. Microbial spoilage is a concern for any type of processed food. Studies have shown that ''

Saccharomyces bailii ''Zygosaccharomyces bailii'' is a species in the genus '' Zygosaccharomyces''. It was initially described as ''Saccharomyces bailii'' by Lindner in 1895, but in 1983 it was reclassified as ''Zygosaccharomyces bailii'' in the work by Barnett et a ...

'' and '' Lactobacillus fructivorans'' are two common microorganisms that spoil salad dressings. ''Lactobacillus fructivorans'' is a facultative anaerobe that is acid tolerant, and can survive in a low pH food such as blue cheese dressing.

References

{{portal bar, Food Dips (food) Salad dressings American condiments

Culinary uses

Safety and storage

See also

References