Ginger Salad Dressing
Love ginger? You'll love this homemade salad dressing recipe! It's full of fresh ginger flavor, balanced by a touch of maple syrup and apple cider vinegar.
Updated by Kathryne Taylor on September 2, 2024
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Ginger lovers, this salad dressing is for you! It’s warming and bright, but not too fiery. I’m trying to eat more greens between the holidays, so it seemed like the perfect time to share.
This salad dressing recipe is easy to whip up and keeps for a week or longer in the fridge. You’ll need olive oil, apple cider vinegar, a touch of maple syrup, and fresh ginger.
The flavors in this ginger dressing play so well with this season’s fresh produce—think pears or apples, pomegranate, and roasted sweet potato or butternut. Feta or goat cheese, pecans or pepitas would all be nice accents. I can’t think of a green that wouldn’t benefit from a drizzle of it.
You’ve perhaps seen this dressing in my sweet potato, arugula and wild rice salad and pomegranate and pear salad, which are two of my favorite hearty winter salads. If you’re looking for a gingery dressing that would complement a meal with Asian flavors, I’d recommend trying my carrot ginger dressing instead. Please let me know how you like this dressing in the comments!
Watch How to Make Ginger Dressing
Ginger Salad Dressing
Love ginger? You’ll love this homemade salad dressing recipe! It’s full of fresh ginger flavor, balanced by a touch of maple syrup and apple cider vinegar. Recipe yields ¾ cup dressing.
Ingredients
- ½ cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 2 tablespoons apple cider vinegar, to taste
- 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
- 1 tablespoon maple syrup or honey, to taste
- 2 teaspoons finely grated fresh ginger
- ½ teaspoon fine sea salt
- About 20 twists of freshly ground black pepper
Instructions
- In a jar or small bowl, whisk together all of the ingredients until fully blended. Sometimes, if your mustard is cold, it will need a few minutes to warm up before it fully incorporates.
- Taste, and adjust if necessary—for more tartness, add another teaspoon of apple cider vinegar, or for more sweetness/balance, add another teaspoon or two of maple syrup (I usually add one).
- This salad dressing will keep well in the refrigerator for up to 10 days. Real olive oil can solidify slightly when cold; if that happens, simple let it warm to room temperature for a few minutes or microwave it in a microwave-safe jar for no more than 15 to 30 seconds.
Notes
Recipe adapted from my basic vinaigrette, crossed with the “liquid gold” salad dressing in my cookbook, Love Real Food.
Make it vegan: Be sure to use maple syrup instead of honey.
Nutrition
The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice. See our full nutrition disclosure here.
I made this dressing the other night and it was absolutely delicious! I pulled it off one of you Dec. or Nov. recipes and had it on a mixture of leftover Thanksgiving ingredients: kale, arugula, celery, apple, and pomegranate! I omitted the maple syrup, since I am not big on sweet. Will certainly make again!!
Thanks for sharing! Sounds delicious, Barbara.
Love Ginger Dressing! I will be making this tonight! The main reason for my comment is to say WOW! I LOVE YOUR COOKBOOK!! I bought one for myself, but ended up giving it as an early Christmas present to my daughter. She has already made a few of your recipes, and she is raving about them! I will be ordering a few more as
gifts, and another one for myself! Thanks! It’s a beautiful book!
Thank you on both! I’m so happy to hear that! I appreciate your comment and review, Aim.
Love this dressing! I like a good punch of ginger, so I doubled that when I made mine. Super yummy so simple!
This dressing looks amazing! I need to try it asap!
Paige
http://thehappyflammily.com
Thank you! Let me know what you think.
Dear Kate (and Cookie, too, of course),
I love your recipes. I bought your cookbook, too, and I frequently and happily cook from it. I have contentedly lived for months on your brown rice risotto. The only place where our tastes differ is in salad dressing. I don’t want either honey or maple syrup in mine. Do you have another ingredient you could recommend to remove some of the tartness? Thanks.
Jodi
Hi Jodi! I’m sorry you don’t love the salad dressings. I find the honey/maple really helps to balance. Without trying other options, I’m not sure sorry!
If you can get it, try E.D. Smith fruit-based syrups with no added sugars. That’s what I use.
Have made this several times – so good. Either maple syrup or honey.
Thanks for sharing, Joan!
Have made this several times – so good. Either maple syrup or honey. I use preserved ginger, and find that is even better than fresh. Also, I keep this for weeks in the refrigerator, just have to remember to pull it out early so the oil liquefies.
Thank you for sharing, Joan!
This sounds delicious and healthy and a bit different. Looking forward to trying it! Thanks!
Let me know what you think!
Have not made it yet but sounds great! Could I use finely grated crystalized ginger if I rubbed off the sugar? It might add a bit of sweetness in lieu of honey or syrup.
This is delicious!! I was tempted to just eat it out of the jar without the salad, but resisted with difficulty.
This is my new go to salad dressing.
Love your recipes, Kate
I’m glad you liked it! I appreciate your review, Shoba.
I store fresh ginger in the freezer and grate as needed. Would I use the same quantity as fresh?
I haven’t froze my ginger, but I would assume so! Let me know what you think. Adjust the ginger quantity as needed.
I made this dressing with your sweet potato and arugula salad a few weeks ago and loved it so much that I made it again to dress a kale salad of my own creation! I don’t always love ginger—sometimes it’s a little too spicy and overpowering for me—but this dressing finds the perfect balance of warm spice and sweetness. Yum!
I’m so glad you loved it, Katie!
Mmm…I love all things ginger!
I made the Ginger Dressing tonight – not sure what I may have done wrong but it was very oily and overcame the ginger and other ingredients.
I had the same results! I love this dressing, but not sure why mine is not tasting correctly. Too oily!!
I love your recipes! Unlike Jodi, Though, I dislike Dijon mustard and Apple cider vinegar. So many American and French dressing LOVE mustard. Anything I could substitute sour those ingredients? I like more subtle vinegars, like sherry or white balsamic so I can substitute for those. But the mustard is hard, I don’t like any mustards as the vinegars are just too strong for me. Any thoughts?
Hi Jane, sorry I don’t have great substitutions for you as both of those really help make this dressing.
Your salad dressings are the best, I use this one and the sunshine salad dressing exclusively.
I have a great deal of dietary restrictions and salads are my salvation. I used your fall salad recipe as a guideline and use lettuce base and chop up an apple add some cheese and this salad dressing.
I use sunshine salad dressing for beet salad, and sometime I have steak salad. I slice onions on the mandolin and marinate them with a little rice vinegar, I can’t tolerate the stronger vinegars and use it exclusively. I made your lentil soup today and I like it,
My favorite salad dressing. My friends all love it as well thank you for sharing.
You’re welcome! I’m glad you loved it.
Yummo thanks for these great ginger dressing recipes, it’s summer here in Australia so perfect for salad season!
You’re welcome, Lainie!
My husband and I love to cook. We try not to eat any processed food.
We made this dressing, and we love it! We poured it over our home made crab cakes. Delicious!
We would have given a six star if it was an option.
One of my all time fav salad dressing recipes.Very versatile.Thanks so much
Oh my gosh. Finally made this, and it’s absolutely delicious. I needed something that would motivate me to eat salad greens during the winter, and this is it. I’m currently looking for recipes for things to make that will go well with this salad dressing, just so I can eat more of it. :)
That’s great, Tiffany! I’m happy you love this dressing.
Delicious! I have been searching for a good ginger salad dressing recipe for a while and this is it! My search is over which I think my family is kind of happy about since they won’t have to try any other ones now. The dressing is very easy to make and is good on so many different salads. Green salads, grain salads, potatoes, roasted veggies etc. Absolutely perfect! I usually make a double batch so that we won’t run out of it right away. Either honey our maple syrup is good. I buy fresh ginger and just store it it in the freezer and grate it as needed. That way the ginger won’t go bad. Same amount as if it wasn’t frozen.
Wonderful to hear, Annika! Thanks for your review.
Hi Kate, I made this dressing & a few of your recipes for Christmas day lunch . The dressing is just beautiful & the other dishes were also delicious & they disappeared quickly.
I love your site & recipes, thank you so much.
just made this, very nice even though I did 2 TB of ginger instead of 2 tsp. used maple syrup. thanks for the recipie.
Looks yummy will surley try this weekend, thank you for sharing this amazing blog.
I made this last night and it was a big hit. I put it on a mix of baby greens with chopped dried apricots and sliced almonds. I love your recipes Kate. Thanks!
You’re welcome, Lea!
Great dressing for a bowl. Thanks Kate.
This is a wonderful recipe. It’s right now my favorite. The only thing I changed is, that I added some tahini. Try it out!!
Thank you for sharing, Annette! I do love tahini, I may need to give that a try.
I made this salad with this dressing….so yummy!
Endive- cut in half and core out triangle in stem.
Baby arugula
Mandarin Orange slices
1 Apple diced
Roquefort crumbled
Toasted lightly walnuts
More grated orange zest
WONDERFUL!!!
I’m glad you loved it! I appreciate the review.
Love it! It has quickly become my favorite go to dressing. I make a batch once a week.
great article..
Absolutely wonderful dressing. Thank you for sharing!
This was so easy and so delicious! I took it with a simple tossed salad to my daughter’s house and my four year old grandson said he LIKED his salad! I am going to make this again for my work-from-home “Stat Frig Food” options for this week, and will try the Carrot-Ginger version next week.
Thank you for reporting back, Jamie! I appreciate your review.
Can ground ginger (spice) be used. Or does it have be to be fresh?
Hi! You can try to substitute it, but fresh is really best. Make sure to use less ground! It will be overpowering.
Hey Kate! The dressing is tasty. I tried with as is and it was good but it became very good once I added more ginger (to taste) and salt and pepper. I’m adding this one to my collection. Thank you!
This is the best dressing I’ve had in a LONG time! Definitely making it again soon
Great to hear, Meg! I appreciate you taking the time to review.
Amazing salad dressing! Just made it and used it on a chopped apples (with skin on) and shaved uncooked brussel sprouts. I LOVE it! Thanks for the great recipe.
Thank you, Mary! I’m happy to hear that.
Your salad dressings are the best, I use this one and the sunshine salad dressing exclusively.
I have a great deal of dietary restrictions and salads are my salvation. I used your fall salad recipe as a guideline and use lettuce base and chop up an apple add some cheese and this salad dressing.
I use sunshine salad dressing for beet salad, and sometime I have steak salad. I slice onions on the mandolin and marinate them with a little rice vinegar, I can’t tolerate the stronger vinegars and use it exclusively. I made your lentil soup today and I like it,
Delicious – I substituted rice wine vinegar and increased by approx. 6X the vinegar. Served over Boston green lettuce, razor-thin cucumbers and cilantro. Perfect fresh salad paired with a Thai pineapple chicken red curry. Yum!
I’m glad you loved it, Suzanne!
I made this yesterday and it was wonderful. I did add more ginger and maple syrup and also added some sesame oil; absolutely delicious!
Elise
This is so simple, yet extremely flavorful. Has become a regular go-to! Powdered ginger also works very well if fresh ginger isn’t available.
I made this in the past and this time if seemed a lot sweeeter. Did the recipe change?
It didn’t. You can always adjust the sweetener to your taste.
I added more ginger, more salt, and a tad more vinegar – away from the sweet. I did grate the ginger but may try blending it more in a bullet to incorporate the ginger – I’m letting it sit in the frig for a while before I do that to see how the flavor changes. I was shy about the black pepper but went back and added it all :) Thanks! I’m new to this site, but it’s proving to be great :)))
I made this dressing for some holiday gatherings and got many requests for the recipe, it is a delicious salad dressing! I did increase both the ginger and vinegar (almost double) for more brightness, and also made a mustard free version for someone who’s allergic, which was also great. Now it’s a staple in my kitchen.
I love that, Dianne!
Excellent dressing!! Only thing in make for my salad I add a little fresh lemon juice as well yum ..yum. ThankYou .
You’re welcome, Leslie!
Hi Kate
I just discovered your site and ginger recipe, I made it as your recipe stated and love it. I am not vegetarian, however, I want to add more balance and healthy meals to my table and I will be looking into your cookbook for ideas, cheers, Jody
Thank you, Jody! I appreciate your review.
This was delicious! I used the dressing for a raw shredded purple and green cabbage slaw. I used maple syrup and a sharp German mustard, because it’s all I had on hand at the time. I tend to like much less oil, so I did reduce the oil to a quarter of what was called for, and it was perfect for our taste! With something as robust as cabbage, the dressing flavors were perfect…not too sweet and with a nice hint of mustard and ginger in every bite! Will be using it again and want to try your carrot ginger dressing next!
Great to hear, Kay! Thank you for your review.
Amazing! I made pasta and shrimp dish and used this as sauce. It was heaven!
Great to hear, Allison!
SO very tasty! My husband and I love it! The only thing I did differently was that I added 1/3 cup of oil instead of 1/2. I just personally like a little less oil in the flavor. I will be sharing this recipe with friends and family and will definitely be making it over and over again.
I’m glad you loved it, Jennifer!