Asian Salad Dressing

This Asian salad dressing is tangy and umami rich with a spicy fresh oriental flavour! With sesame, soy, rice vinegar, ginger and rayu (Japanese chili oil), this Asian salad dressing recipe will brighten up any regular salad! Watch how quickly your next salad disappears from the kitchen table!

Asian Salad Dressing

We just keep coming back to this Asian salad dressing. It's healthy, with an irresistibly fresh flavour bomb - perfect for salad! We use this sweet savory dressing for Asian slaw, noodle salad, green salads and more!

What makes this dressing 'oriental' is the combination of toasted sesame, ginger and soy sauce. Unlike wafu dressing, Japanese style dressing, intense sesame flavour can be experienced. You'll find this sesame ginger dressing irresistible!

I love salad, and this terrific sesame ginger dressing is my staple go to dressing. It’s ideal for any Asian salad recipes, and I just love it with onion slices, green leaves, grilled mushrooms or even steamed vegetables!

Bring joy into your life and share it with your loved ones! Read on!

You Will Love This Asian Dressing

Homemade salad dressing is much better than shop bought. It's fresh, no additives, preservatives or too much sugar. For me, I much prefer knowing what ingredients I’m using. This fabulous sesame ginger dressing is great for any salad, but I really love it with an Asian coleslaw recipe.

Versatile

Try this recipe for Asian salad with cherry tomatoes or sliced avocados or toss it in a sliced carrot and cabbage salad. Who can resist crisp cabbage slaw?! Experiment! I’m yet to find vegetables it doesn’t work with!

The vegetables which work with this Asian sesame dressing can be:

• edamame
• sliced onions
• cherry tomatoes
• sliced avocado
• red pepper
• cucumber
• wakame seaweed

The Ingredients

When oil, vinegar and sugar meet, they create a sensation! It’s the base for so many great Asian dressings. The following ingredients make this the oriental flavour bomb that it is:

Toasted sesame seeds are full of flavour, nutty and rich in taste. I always use roasted sesame seeds. If you don't have them, you can easily make them at home. I’ve added a link to how to roast sesame seeds in the recipe card.

Toasted sesame oil: I only use toasted sesame oil. Untoasted sesame oil has a lighter, yellow colour. Toasted sesame is brownish. It’s more flavourful with a rich nutty aroma.

Sugar and soy sauce work very well together. This combination gives the dressing a classic oriental flavour. You can experience that combination in teriyaki sauce, made from sugar/mirin and soy sauce. This induces the umami of other ingredients. If you prefer, replace sugar with maple syrup.

Japanese soy sauce: You can use either dark or light soy sauce. I use organic soy sauce from Kikkoman, Japan's leading soy sauce maker. I recommend using Japanese soy sauce but if you don’t have any in the cupboard, by all means try another type! If you prefer gluten-free, Kikkoman has it. Or use gluten-free tamari.

Rice vinegar: I use Japanese rice vinega, kome su, from Marukan, a leading Japanese rice wine maker. I love Japanese rice wine. It has little sweetness and is milder than Western white vinegar and Japanese kokumotsu su (corn and wheat vinegar).

Rayu (Japanese chili oil) is Japan's super ingredient. We both love it! If, like me, you prefer a bit of spiciness, then you’ll love it too. But you can leave it out, if you don’t like spiciness, or just use a little less.

Rayu is versatile and is widely used for gyoza, ramen, smashed cucumber salad or pretty much anything you can dream up in Japan. It's easily available, not only at local Japanese shops, but also at most regular super market these days. It's super spicy so control how much you add.

How to Make Asian Salad Dressing

This Asian salad dressing recipe is easy and super quick to make. My favourite way is to use a Mayson jar, an air-tight glass container. Glass jars are preferred. You can simply add all the ingredients, put a lid on it and shake. Done! It's show time! Pour it over the salad.

That's it! Serve immediately. Enjoy!

How to save

You can save this dressing for up to one week in an air-tight glass container. Make sure it's washed with detergent and dried completely. Keep the jar in the fridge.

If oil and other ingredients are separated before to use, just shake the jar until all the ingredients are well combined.

If you remove ginger and toasted sesame seeds, this dressing can last for two weeks. Then add them to the dressing before you use.

Enjoy More Salad Recipes

Asian Slaw

Wafu Dressing

Japanese Cucumber Salad

Smashed Cucumber Salad

Sunomono Salad