what we ate: the best salad dressing

If you asked me one of my favorite meals you would never hear me say the word salad. Never. I love things like french fries, bread with butter, pasta, homemade pizza.....so the idea of eating a salad rarely comes to my mind when thinking of what to have for dinner. Growing up I can vividly remember fishing out the croutons in the salads my mom made (which were few...sorry mom it is true) and munching on those and only those. Salads are hard to get right. You need good greens. I always seem to get grossed out by the greens of a salad when I make it. I feel the same way about hamburgers-you hand me one fully cooked and goodbye hamburger-you expect me to shape that cold gooey meat into a patty and goodbye Abby. Same with salad greens. Then my sister Emily (my oldest sister) introduced me to making my own dressings. Simple. Really simple...not "simple" like Martha Stewart says after she just casually made the perfect pate brisee.....she kinda lies when she says simple. I do not. When I say simple I mean simple.

Now remember when I told you my mom did not use to make many salads-well here is her redeeming moment with salads! Basil Cilantro Dressing. WHAT!!??! Did you just say two of my favorite things in the whole word together in a recipe? Suddenly I am making salad for lunch, salad for dinner, salad for breakfast (no, no not breakfast...that is my sacred meal....never salad for breakfast) but really it is that good and simple. I even plan on growing solely basil and cilantro in my garden this year so that I have two resources to pull from when needing to make this dressing (my garden and the grocery store). Yes it is that good. Try it and talk to me...and if it is not then you can call me Martha....as we know she tends to lie sometimes.

The recipe: ( confession-I have a tendency to add to recipes more of an ingredient if I really like it....so feel free to do that too....or just stick to the recipe... since I know some of us might be type A)

1 cup cilantro
1/3 cup basil
1 clove garlic
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/8 teaspoon pepper

Put it all in a food processor and blend it up....and there you go...enough for seconds and thirds!