A Test Run at Feta Dressing

Brier Pizza (formerly Neapolis) has always had a house feta salad dressing that is the dressing of choice when dining there, both for salads and dipping your pizza crust in (a culinary habit the kids introduced us to). The recipe isn't given out, but a former cook told me there were "5 ingredients". A bottle costs $6 which we have indulged in more than a couple times, but I wanted to be able to replicate it at home. The following is attempt number 1, which came out pretty close I think. With some further testing and the tweaking, I think it would be "close enough". This recipe I can't take full credit for, as it was the one that looked closest from a variety of web recipes. The original recipe called for garlic powder which I substituted, and oregano which I eliminated.

[I am also with this post experimenting with a different posting method, using MS Word's Publish function. The last post was very painful to format, and the addition of the pictures dufured everything up, eliciting more than a couple of choice words.]

Ingredients:

• 1 cup mayonnaise
  
• ½ cup sour cream
  
• 4 teaspoon white vinegar
  
• ¼ teaspoon black pepper
  
• 1 minced garlic clove
  
• 2 oz. crumbled feta cheese
  
• 1 to 2 tablespoons milk
  

Directions

Combine mayonnaise, sour cream and feta cheese in food processor. Process while adding vinegar. Add garlic and process, then add seasonings to taste. Add milk last until desired thickness is achieved. Best to let sit for a few hours before serving.

*** February 16, 2010 Update

I made a full batch today with the blender (for the above post I made a test ½ batch and blended it by hand). I wouldn't modify the ingredients but the directions I would. I used the blender to first thoroughly crumble the feta to a fine bread crumb like consistency. Then I added the mayo and sour cream. This worked well at eliminating some of the lumpiness I had in my test batch, but more feta than I wanted stayed at the bottom of blender after everything was done. I think next time I will crumble the feta fine in a dry blender, then take it out into a ramekin or small bowl. Then blend the mayo, sour cream and some milk before adding in the feta.

The other thing I will note is that the dressing got much thicker after a day in the refrigerator, so adding a bit of extra milk up front and letting it sit seems to be called for.

On quantity, the above recipe will make a little bit more than will fit in the typical 12oz salad dressing bottle.