Ranch Dressing: The Surprising History, the Original Recipe, and How to Make It at Home

A quick word for our visitors

If you traveled to the United States this summer to follow your team, you have probably run into a creamy white sauce that Americans put on almost everything. Pizza crust, chicken wings, raw carrots, salad, French fries. That sauce is ranch, and a lot of first time visitors fall hard for it. The good news is that you do not need to wrestle a bottle through airport security to take it home. Real ranch is something you make in your own kitchen in about five minutes, and the homemade version tastes better than anything on a shelf.

Here is the story of where ranch came from, the original style recipe, a few fun variations, and exactly how to make it wherever you live.

Where ranch actually comes from

Ranch was not invented by a food company. It was invented by a plumber.

In the early 1950s, a contractor named Steve Henson was working remote jobs in Alaska and cooking for his crews. To liven up plain salads, he mixed buttermilk, mayonnaise, and a handful of herbs and seasonings into a tangy, creamy dressing. The crews loved it.

A few years later Henson and his wife Gayle bought a guest ranch near Santa Barbara, California, and named it Hidden Valley Ranch. Guests at the ranch kept asking for that dressing, then started asking to buy jars to take home. By the late 1950s the Hensons were selling seasoning packets by mail and in stores, and the name of the ranch became the name of the dressing.

When we were kids in the 70's we made dressing with packets and added the wet ingredients. Some came as kits with carafes. They're still available today and a great way to get kids involved with helping to make dinner.

In 1972 the Clorox company bought the brand for a reported eight million dollars. The biggest change came in 1983, when the first shelf stable bottled version arrived. To survive on a store shelf, the fresh buttermilk and mayonnaise were swapped for oils, stabilizers, and preservatives. That is the trade ranch made to go national. Convenience went up, and the fresh tang of the original went down.

It worked commercially. Ranch passed Italian to become the best selling salad dressing in America in 1992, and it has held that spot ever since. What most people taste from a bottle, though, is a long way from what Steve Henson stirred together for his crew.

Why homemade beats the bottle

Once you make ranch from scratch, the bottled stuff is hard to go back to. Homemade gives you:

• Real buttermilk tang instead of a flat, oily base
• Fresh herbs you can actually taste
• No gums, fillers, or preservatives you cannot pronounce
• Full control over salt, garlic, and thickness
• A finished jar for roughly the cost of the milk

It also takes about five minutes, which is the part that surprises people most.

The original style buttermilk ranch

This is a faithful nod to the original: buttermilk and mayonnaise carrying fresh herbs and a little garlic. The exact Hidden Valley formula has always been a company secret, so think of this as the homemade version that started it all rather than a copy of the modern bottle.

Makes one pint (two cups) 

Ingredients

• 1 cup mayonnaise
• 1/2 cup buttermilk, plus more to thin
• 1/4 cup sour cream, optional, for a thicker dip
• 1 tablespoon fresh chives, chopped, or 1 teaspoon dried
• 1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped, or 1 teaspoon dried
• 1 tablespoon fresh dill, chopped, or 1 teaspoon dried
• 1/2 teaspoon garlic powder, or 1 small clove, grated
• 1/2 teaspoon onion powder
• 1/2 teaspoon fine salt
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice or white vinegar

Directions

1. Add every ingredient to a pint Mason jar.
2. Cover the jar with a reCAP POUR or FLIP and shake, until smooth.
3. Taste and adjust. More buttermilk for a pourable dressing, more sour cream or mayonnaise for a thick dip.
4. Chill for at least 30 minutes before serving.

The technique that makes or breaks it

The recipe is forgiving, but a few habits separate good ranch from great ranch.

• Use real buttermilk. It is the source of that signature tang. Plain milk leaves the dressing tasting flat. If you cannot find buttermilk, stir 1 teaspoon of lemon juice or vinegar into 1/2 cup of milk and let it sit for five minutes. Or use kefir.
• Give it a rest. Thirty minutes in the fridge lets dried herbs soften and the garlic mellow into the base. Ranch made an hour ahead tastes noticeably rounder than ranch served straight away.
• Think dressing versus dip. Loosen with buttermilk for salads and drizzling. Hold back the liquid, or lean on sour cream, when you want something thick enough to cling to a carrot or a wing.
• Salt last. Mayonnaise and buttermilk already carry salt, so season at the end and adjust to taste.

Five ways to riff on ranch

Once the base technique clicks, ranch becomes a template. A few of our favorites:

• Lighter Greek yogurt ranch. Swap the mayo and sour cream for Greek yogurt to cut the richness while keeping the creaminess. We have the full version in our Healthy Ranch Dip recipe.
• Kefir ranch. Use kefir in place of the buttermilk for an even tangier, probiotic rich dressing. It is a natural fit if you already ferment at home, and we walk through it in our kefir recipe book.
• Dairy free ranch. Vegan mayo plus unsweetened plant milk, a squeeze of lemon, and the same herbs gets you there with no dairy at all.
• Spicy ranch. Whisk in a spoonful of hot sauce or a little chipotle for dipping wings and fries.
• Avocado ranch. Blend in half a ripe avocado for a green, silky dressing that doubles as a sandwich spread.

Keep it fresh in a Mason jar

Ranch is best within about a week, so a sealed jar in the fridge is the ideal home for it. Mix and store it right in a Mason jar with a reCAP lid and you skip the disposable container entirely.

• Reach for a POUR lid when you want to drizzle dressing over a salad.
• Reach for a FLIP lid when you want to scoop and dip.

Shake the jar to mix, seal it, and it is ready to grab whenever hunger strikes.

No single use plastic necessary

Ranch started as something one person made by hand for the people around him, long before it ever came in a bottle. That is still the best way to enjoy it. Make a jar this week, keep it in the fridge, and put it on everything.