1 -2 -3 Vinaigrette

In French cooking there are a few standard sauces that serve as the base for variations. Technically they're called "mother" sauces. Appropriately, I learned this from the mother of my French exchange program family. I always think of it as 1 - 2 - 3 sauce because that is the proportion of the recipe. One mustard, two acid, three oil. In any vinaigrette you need three basic elements: mustard, an acid (like a lemon juice, verjus, or vinegar), and an oil.

I call this sauce a base or "Mother" sauce because you can easily derive many variations of vinaigrette from it. Switch a sesame oil and a rice wine vinegar and the sauce has Asian flavors. Substitute a gentle hazelnut oil for the olive oil or a purple mustard for the traditional Dijon, or use a grainy mustard… you get the idea, the variations are infinite.


1 - 2 - 3 Vinaigrette
You need a lot less dressing than you think. A rough estimate is 5 cups of loosely packed bite sized pieces of salad to one recipe of vinaigrette.

1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
2 teaspoons red wine vinegar
3 teaspoons extra virgin olive oil
pinch sea salt
pinch freshly ground pepper


The trick to getting a really creamy vinaigrette lies in emulsifying it properly.
Whisk together the salt, pepper, mustard and vinegar to form a uniform paste. Add the olive oil in an extremely slow steady drizzle while you whisk briskly. Every once in a while to check the olive oil is fully encorporated and the mixture looks creamy. This recipe can be multiplied and made in the blender.


There are a couple of things I like to keep in mind when I make a salad. I love to make the dressing in the bottom of the bowl, before I put in the greens. I set the greens loosely on top. This way the salad is all ready to go to the table and await tossing. If you toss the salad just before you serve it, you end up with crisp greens rather than the wilty sludge that comes from a premature tossing. When you do serve it, toss the salad a lot more than you generally believe is necessary. That way everything is definitely coated.