Sauces & dressings · Salad dressings

Balsamic vinaigrette

Name: Balsamic vinaigrette
Prep time: 5 min
Total time: 5 min
Yield: 8 servings
Ingredients: 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar; 1/2 cup olive oil; 2 tsp Dijon mustard; 1 1/2 tsp honey; 1 small clove garlic, grated; 1/4 tsp salt; 1/4 tsp black pepper

The default dressing of every salad-eating household, shaken in a jar in one minute: balsamic, dijon, honey, olive oil. Knowing the ratio means never buying a bottle again.

Time: 5 min (5 prep + 0 cook)
Servings: 8
Per serving: 136 kcal
Protein: 0 g

Ingredients

1/4 cup balsamic vinegar60 g
1/2 cup olive oil110 g
2 tsp Dijon mustard12 g
1 1/2 tsp honey10 g
1 small clove garlic, grated4 g
1/4 tsp salt2 g
1/4 tsp black pepper1 g

Every ingredient links to its food page — same data, same score, same formula.

Steps

Everything in a jar, lid on, shake hard for 20 seconds. The dijon is the emulsifier — it's what keeps it creamy instead of split.
Taste on a leaf, not a spoon: dressing that tastes right off a spoon is too mild on salad.
Keeps two weeks in the fridge. The oil solidifies when cold — ten minutes on the counter and a fresh shake brings it back.

What's the master ratio?

Three parts oil to one part acid, a spoon of mustard, a small sweetener. Swap the balsamic for lemon, the honey for maple, add herbs — every vinaigrette you've ever bought is this template wearing a label.

Why this score

engineered against fullness

Concentrated sugar, with little protein or fiber to slow it down; dense calories with little protein, volume or fiber to fill you up.

Three routes to fullness — one is enough

0% of kcal

29% water

1 g/Mcal

What pulls it down

58%

11%

How scores work

Computed on the finished dish, not an average of the parts: 1090 kcal goes into the pot, 199 g of ingredients comes out as ~190 g of food → 574 kcal per 100 g. Cooking moves water, and energy density is the score's biggest lever — so we show the math. Full formula here.

Per

Calories: 574
Protein: (0%); 1 g
Fat: (92%); 58 g
Carbohydrates: (8%); 11 g
of which sugar: 9 g
Fiber: <1 g
Sodium: 487 mg

Percentages are the share of calories from each macronutrient.

Computed from the ingredients' USDA data — nothing typed by hand. Every number is traceable, every score recomputable.

More sauces & dressings

Photo: AI-generated. Nutrition and score are computed from the ingredients with the published formula — this recipe hasn't been kitchen-tested by us yet.