Hi all, I have just a quick one today. It’s healthy, easy cranberry vinaigrette for dressing up fall and winter salads. You’ll want to keep this recipe handy, since it is a nice way to switch up your usual salad routine and it has tons of flavor. It is also special enough for Thanksgiving or your holiday table. Oops, is it too early to start talking about Thanksgiving?
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I mostly just have photos to show you since this is such a simple recipe. I mean, it is just a salad dressing after all . What is there to say? It is sour and tastes good on greens?
Speaking of photos, like the little wooden bowl? Carey‘s dad made it, and she gave it to me when we were working on a photo shoot for EatingWell last week. [Yes I did a little styling, so much for being a recovering food stylist for the time being.] It was a lot of fun to play in the studio for for the day. My tweezers got a workout. But then I had to get back to my office to get the first half of my manuscript off to the publisher. Phew. I am whooped. I am even feeling a little sore throat action going on. Grr.
Anywho, so let’s chat about this cranberry vinaigrette. The cranberries are naturally very tart, so you only need a little bit of vinegar to get the right balance. I chopped some fresh thyme from my garden, and added that to the dressing. I always love a bit of allium in my dressings. In this case I used shallot from the farmers’ market. I also think a touch of agave or honey is nice to balance it out.
It pairs well with spinach, toasted nuts, and sharp cheeses. This would be killer on salad for Thanksgiving.
How to Make Vinaigrette Dressing
If you’re new to the world of homemade vinaigrettes, welcome! For most salad dressings, you can simply add all the ingredients into a jar and shake everything together until combined. But for this cranberry vinaigrette you’ll need to add everything to a food processor since not all the ingredients are liquid.
If this vinaigrette is too sharp for you, add a little more agave or honey, or scale back on the amount of cranberries you use. You could also try adding a bit more olive oil, but don’t add too much!
But like I said, this vinaigrette is super easy to make and tastes good with pretty much any fall dish.
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PinDescription
This vegan cranberry vinaigrette is made with fresh cranberries, chopped thyme, and shallot. It’s naturally tart, so you only need a little vinegar.
Ingredients
- 1 shallot, peeled, cored and quartered
- ½ cup fresh cranberries
- ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
- ¼ cup walnut oil or flax seed oil
- 2 teaspoons red wine vinegar
- 1 teaspoon chopped fresh thyme
- 1 teaspoon agave or honey
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon freshly ground pepper
Instructions
- Puree shallot, cranberries, olive oil, vinegar, walnut or flax oil, thyme, agave or honey, salt and pepper in a mini prep, food processor or blender until as smooth as possible. Store in a jar in the refrigerator up to 1 week.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: about 2 tablespoons
- Calories: 127
- Sugar: 0 g
- Sodium: 143 mg
- Fat: 14 g
- Saturated Fat: 2 g
- Carbohydrates: 3 g
- Fiber: 0 g
- Protein: 0 g
Keywords: cranberry vinaigrette, homemade vinaigrette
More Homemade Vinaigrette Recipes:
Kalamata Olive and Basil Vinaigrette
This looks insanely good! I love intense vinegars and vinaigrettes, and I’m sure this one must be pretty memorable…I like that you use walnut oil, too, it’s my favorite! I just made a cranberry molasses that I’ll be posting soon, it’s probably one of the most potent things I’ve ever tasted 🙂
I love cranberries too Sue. I bet I would love your molasses. I’ll have to stop over to our blog to see it.
Katie,
Great vinaigrette idea for cranberry season. I also like shallots in something being mixed for greens. Beautiful photos!
This looks delicious! I love making homemade dressing- Must try this one!!
Me too Melanie. It only takes a few minutes, and it tastes so much better. Thank you for dropping by.
This looks so good! I love that you used fresh cranberries, I was just having a conversation with someone the other day about how I wish I could have a use for fresh cranberries – other than traditional cranberry sauce – so this is perfect.
I am so with you Karishma. We can buy local cranberries here in the fall, and I hate to have to wait to have them for Thanksgiving only. Have you tried adding them to apple crisp? I am adding that to my to-do list for this fall since we have a whole bushel of apples in our fridge from apple picking. Thank you for stopping by. Have a great weekend.
I often make a quick cranberry sauce for my oatmeal. Sometimes I have other add-ins such as mandarin oranges, or navel orange zest, apple chunks, cinnamon, maple syrup, ginger and the list goes on. It makes for a great breaky or snack!
Homemade dressings are the best and this looks fabulous! I’m thinking it would be delicious on a salad w/ greens, turkey, and avocado. Yum!!!
I am bursting to try that idea now EA. I have no idea why I didn’t think of that myself. I love the idea of doing a deconstructed Thanksgiving salad with this. That has to happen now. {Though avocado would be too good to pass up.}
Wow – this is such a great idea for an autumn/winter salad dressing! I bet it is delicious on a turkey sandwich, too. Glad I found you through Pinterest – I’ll be back for sure!
Amy, I am so glad you found me too. Looking forward to clicking though to following you. I bet it would be good on all sorts of things. The tad bit of honey and walnut oil make it not too powerful to play around with other uses.
I can’t wait to try this tart dressing on some massaged kale! (Perhaps with some roasted delicata? Mmm….) PS- I am always so impressed with your food photography, so gorgeous!
I have been eating delicata like it is my job this fall. YES to the Yes adding it to a salad with this dressing. Do it! Yum. {And thank you for the compliment about the photos, I wasn’t crazy about these actually, so it is nice to hear good feedback on them.}
This vinaigrette looks delicious…and your photography is stunning! Thanks for sharing! 🙂
Hi David! Thank you so much. And I appreciate the compliment about the photos.
Beautiful photos and styling, Katie. The dressing sounds and looks great!
Thank you Angie. I was happy to find a use for the jar here. I had found it at a garage sale with the sole purpose of using it as a prop. So glad I finally got a chance.
I’ve never had cranberry vinaigrette before, but this looks and sounds awesome! Dried cranberries seem like a fairly standard thing in fall-time salads, so this will be a nice way to switch things up a bit and incorporate fresh ones. And it’s definitely not too soon to start talking about Thanksgiving 🙂
Ha glad that I am not the only one who is already looking forward to Thanksgiving. I love Halloween, though not for food reasons. Purely so I can dress up. So I guess that’s why I am already skipping ahead. Glad you stopped by.
I don’t think it’s too early to talk about Thanksgiving, not with how time flies too fast. Thanks for this vinaigrette recipe. It’s awesome, and I could use something new for our Thanksgiving table.
Thanks so much Joshua. I am so glad to know I am not the only one ready to get excited about Thanksgiving.
This cranberry vinaigrette looks and sounds so delicious. I can definitely see myself making the recipe soon… and probably throughout the upcoming Christmas season too. Thanks for the great recipe!
Thalia. Thanks so much 🙂 I hope you like it.
This salad dressing looks amazing!
Thank you Marla. I appreciate it, and I am honored to have you stop by for a visit.
You’re photography is so beautiful and the vinaigrette sounds delicious!!
Thank you so much Emanuelle.
I am absolutely be attracted by the beautiful photos. The dressing must be very delicious and a good helper for presenting yummy salad dishes.
Thank you Elaine. I appreciate it.
This sounds crazy delicious! I love cranberries and just bought some the other day. Can’t wait to make this! Your photos are gorgeous! I love love love the light. I’m so jealous you got to work with Carey! She’s so incredibly sweet and talented. You’ve had a busy week! Congrats on being halfway through the book! Stay well friend! xo
Thank you my dear. Carey is really great. She was propping and she just has the most amazing eye. I love working with her. I have been so busy. Now I am in full head cold/ laryngitis mode unfortunately. I think everything caught up to me. Ugh.
toatlly in love with cranberries right now! yum! 🙂
Good morning! I wanted to let you know I included this recipe in a cranberry roundup post on Chicago Jogger. You recently submitted this recipe. Beautiful photos, by the way!
Sounds great! Thanks for letting me know.
There’s no way I’m waiting for Thanksgiving to enjoy this cranberry vinaigrette! I need to make this asap! It looks so delicious!
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Your pictures are stunning! What an amazing recipe, too!
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I love cranberry in any form. I’m brainstorming all the ingredients I’m going to put in my salad and this vinaigrette will be the shining star on top!
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