The Best Oil For Your Salad Dressing Isn't EVOO

Extra virgin olive oil, the high quality, unrefined, and often cold-pressed pinnacle of olive oil, is a pantry staple for many well-known chefs, restaurateurs, recipe developers, and home cooks alike. Particularly if you don't have a lot of pantry space, you might be tempted to rely on EVOO as your single source of olive oil. If it's the best option available, why not use it for everything, right? Wrong!

According to Lance Knowling, the executive chef at Northridge Restaurant in New Hope, Pennsylvania, extra virgin olive oil has a powerful enough taste that it can actually overwhelm, rather than enhance, what you're serving. This is particularly true when dressing a salad. "I primarily use EVOO as a finishing oil on my salads and cold offerings," says the French-trained chef. "The flavor, for most dressings, is too strong and will mask the flavor of the other ingredients." Instead, Knowling advises using your best olive oil sparingly. "Regular olive oil (with less flavor) is a good choice for everyday dressings," he says, adding that you can drizzle extra virgin oil before serving. At Knowling's rustic-yet-refined restaurant, he builds well-balanced salad dressings like a Caesar vinaigrette. Try it yourself when whipping up your next dressing, like Ina Garten's favorite four-ingredient vinaigrette.

The right ratio for many homemade salad dressings is simple: three parts oil to one part vinegar. Without enough fat, your dressing won't emulsify and will taste unpalatably tangy. Without any acidity from vinegar or citrus, your dressing will taste dull and a little greasy. Still, even when following this rubric, there are literally hundreds of combinations you can create with the types of acidity you use, not to mention all the extra ingredients you can add. But there's actually plenty of room to maneuver in terms of the oil or fat you incorporate as well.

As chef Lance Knowling attests, broadening your reach beyond olive oil in general can make a world of difference. "I use walnut oil, hazelnut oil, and sesame oil for certain dressings and vinaigrettes as well because of their unique flavor," he says. A walnut oil vinaigrette on an apple, walnut, and blue cheese salad sounds like heaven. A hazelnut dressing can add earthy nuance to a plate of greens, dates, and goat cheese. Sesame oil can enrich your Asian-inspired salads with umami flavor. Once you leave olive oil on the shelf, the possibilities are truly endless. But chef Knowling notes that the fat in your dressing doesn't have to be oil at all. "I also use butter fat for my brown butter vinaigrette," he explains.