This Green Goddess Dressing is a lighter version of the classic. It calls for 3/4 cup of Greek yogurt and only 1/4 cup of mayo, but it feels just as luxurious as the full mayo version. Ron typically likes a crisp vinaigrette on salads, but sometimes I crave something creamy and herbal. This is it.
I typically use it as a salad dressing, but I could see happily dipping carrot or celery sticks into this dressing. Green Goddess Dressing would also be great drizzled on roasted asparagus or potatoes. Or better yet – a dip for potato chips! It’s quite versatile. So, is it a salad dressing or a dip? You decide!
This version is a far cry from the original, created in the twenties at the Palace Hotel in San Francisco. Here’s a link to a brief history of Green Goddess Dressing (sadly, this article is slow to load, but it’s interesting and worth the wait!). It’s an unsavory account, but this dressing is so pungent and fresh, it has survived the infamy. The article includes a description of the original recipe, as wells as a recipe for the version of Green Goddess Dressing that’s still served at the Palace Hotel to this day. No canned vegetables in sight!
Green Goddess Dressing
Ingredients
- 1 clove garlic
- 1 1/2 cups parsley, dill, mint, tarragon, basil, and/or cilantro
- 2 scallions
- 1/4 preserved lemon
- 3/4 cup Greek Yogurt (whole milk)
- 1/4 cup mayo
- 1 T olive oil
- 1 t capers
- 1/2 t salt
- 1/4 t black pepper
Instructions
- Prep the veg and lemon – Peel the garlic and give it a rough chop. Clean and chop the fresh herbs and the scallions. Rinse and chop the preserved lemon.
- Process – Drop the garlic into the food processor while it's running and continue processing until the garlic stops bouncing around the bowl. Scrape down the bowl. Add the yogurt and mayo to one side of the bowl. Add the herbs, the preserved lemon, and the scallions to the other side of the bowl, to ensure that the they make contact with the blade when you begin processing. Add the olive oil capers and salt and pepper to the dairy side of the bowl. Run the food processor until the mixture is smooth, green, and creamy looking, with specs of herbs in the mix. Season to taste.
Notes
NOTES ON SUBSTITUTIONS: This recipe for Green Goddess Dressing calls for 1 1/2 cups of herbs. I try to use fresh, but if you don’t have a variety of fresh herbs on hand, and if you have the time to make the dressing in advance, some dried herbs are lovely too – they’ll just need time to reconstitute and lend their essence. I think you need at least 1 cup of fresh parsley and just round it out with the dried herbs. The variety is what makes it so interesting and fresh tasting. The garlic and scallions liven it up, and the preserved lemon is the perfect finishing touch. But of course you could sub in lemon zest and some juice. It would still be as good, just maybe not as punchy.