Two updates; one about salad dressing

Hello all,

I'm working on upgrading Smart Mouth the newsletter to a new platform, and refreshing the format of Smart Mouth the podcast. With the changes I have planned, I’ll be able to take you as readers and listeners deeper into the research process.

Setting it all up properly is a lot of work, and I don't want to rush it. To that end, I'm pausing paid subscriptions until January 13th. 

I also want to take this opportunity to talk about ranch dressing, specifically the original Hidden Valley Ranch recipe. A reader asked me about the pre-1970s, pre-Clorox-ownership dry mix packets.

Image: The Clorox Company

Here’s what the packet looked like in the 1960s, when the owners of the Hidden Valley Ranch in the hills above Santa Barbara, CA, realized they’d have much more success selling these than running a hotel/country club. (So, yes, Hidden Valley Ranch was a real place. And there are other ranches with the same name! I grew up going to the one in Cle Elum, WA.)

I think it was originally marketed as Party Dip because salad dressing was an evolving concept in mid-century America. And ranch dressing specifically didn’t indicated on specific recipe until - here’s a rare moment of specificity - 1969.

Ranch was intended to be a buttermilk-based product, and the first mention I can find of “buttermilk dressing” in newspapers is this item from 1878, which I believe is a joke about how gross cucumbers are? Which apparently was common sentiment, and people called them cowcumbers to be mean. WAY HARSH.

This mention from 1896 is also some sort of joke that I can’t decipher, but then in the early 1900s buttermilk dressing became a regular recipe in the home sections of newspapers - though first it was recommended for fruit salads, and then for fish salads. (Here are some ingredient combos from 1915 that’ll really curl your toes.)

A restaurant in San Angelo, TX called Steve’s Ranch House got tons of media attention in the early 1950s for its dressing, which was just called “Steve’s Ranch House dressing,” so you can imagine the confusion. But it actually sounds very similar to Caesar dressing (officially created in the 1920s), just without the anchovies - and I do believe the cook who made it was OVER IT by 1953.

Here’s an ad from 1961 for bottled “ranch dressing,” with no mention of ingredients, and one from 1964 for “ranch salad dressing mix.” I wanna know what was in it!

Luckily, the Hidden Valley Ranch original ingredients are listed on the package. I’m sure we’re all comfortable skipping the dextrin and the calcium stearate; here are the proportions for the rest of the ingredients that I see most commonly:

1/2 cup mayonnaise (for dip, use sour cream instead)

1/2 cup buttermilk

1/4 teaspoon dried parsley flakes

1/4 teaspoon ground black pepper

1/4 teaspoon MSG

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/8 teaspoon garlic powder

1/8 teaspoon onion powder

1/8 teaspoon dried thyme

Did the original, fresh recipe contain fresh herbs and alliums? If it was developed in Alaska, which it may well have been, probably not. If it was developed in Santa Barbara ... still probably not. It was the 1950s, after all.

Have you tried making it at home? Which is better, dried flavorings or fresh?

Here are my relevant ranch dressing clippings so far.

Thank you for reading and listening!

Katherine