If you enjoy the salad dressing served at Japanese restaurants, this delicious Carrot Ginger Dressing recipe is for you. Seasoned with miso, rice vinegar, and sesame oil, this sweet-tangy dressing will zest up your salad. It‘s a light and refreshing addition to any meal.
Many Japanese restaurants in the U.S. serve a salad with either Sesame Dressing or Carrot Ginger Dressing (にんじんドレッシング). While the sesame dressing is creamy and mild, this carrot ginger dressing is light and refreshing with a kick of ginger.
Why You’ll Love This Carrot Ginger Dressing
- It’s SUPER easy and quick to make. Ready in 10 minutes.
- Tastes just like the Japanese restaurant dressing you love. Maybe better!
- Homemade dressings are healthier than store-bought.
- Works great in any salad combination.
- Look at the color. It’s bright, refreshing, and zingy!
All You Need is 10 Pantry Ingredients!
If you cook a few Japanese dishes, you will have these ingredients in your pantry and refrigerator.
- Carrot
- Onion
- Ginger
- Rice vinegar
- Oil
- Sesame oil
- Miso (I use mellow and mild white miso)
- Sugar
- Salt
- Freshly ground black pepper
That’s it, you can make the carrot ginger dressing right now! 🙂
For the authentic taste, use rice vinegar because it is much milder in flavor than other vinegar.
Use a Food Processor or Blender
Using a food processor makes it easier to create a smooth texture for the dressing.
I use my Cuisinart Food Processor that I have had for years, but if you have a high-powered home blender such as Vitamix, it will work really nicely too.
How to Store Carrot Ginger Dressing
You can store this homemade dressing in an airtight container like a mason jar for up to 1 week in the refrigerator. I recommend pouring out the amount you use in another serving dish and putting the rest of the dressing back in the refrigerator right away. That way, you can keep it for up to 2 weeks. Shake well before you use it.
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Carrot Ginger Dressing
Ingredients
- 1 carrot (4.8 oz, 135 g)
- ¼ onion (2.5 oz, 70 g)
- 1 knob ginger (1 inch, 2.5 cm; 0.6 oz, 17 g; use young/spring ginger for a milder taste, preferably)
- 1½ Tbsp sugar
- 1 Tbsp miso (use white miso for a mild, mellow taste)
- ¼ tsp Diamond Crystal kosher salt (to taste)
- freshly ground black pepper (to taste)
- 1 tsp toasted sesame oil
- ½ cup rice vinegar (unseasoned) (rice vinegar is mild; DO NOT substitute it with other vinegars as they are too acidic and strong)
- ¼ cup neutral oil
Instructions
- Gather all the ingredients.
- Peel 1 carrot and chop it into ½- to 1-inch (1.25- to 2.5-cm) pieces.
- Chop ¼ onion into 1-inch (2.5-cm) pieces.
- Peel 1 knob ginger and slice into small pieces. Put all the chopped vegetables into a food processor.
- Purée until fine and smooth.
- To the food processor, add 1½ Tbsp sugar, 1 Tbsp miso, ¼ tsp Diamond Crystal kosher salt, and freshly ground black pepper.
- Add 1 tsp toasted sesame oil, ½ cup rice vinegar (unseasoned), and ¼ cup neutral oil.
- Process again until the dressing is completely smooth. Taste the dressing and adjust the seasoning with salt. If it‘s too sour, add a bit more sugar. If you prefer the dressing to be lighter, add water to thin it (I don‘t add water so the dressing will keep longer).
To Serve
- Shake well and serve over a green salad (here, I have iceberg lettuce, cucumber slices, and tomatoes).
To Store
- You can store the dressing in an airtight container or mason jar for up to 1 week. If you take out the portion you need and put the dressing back into the refrigerator right away, it will keep for up to 2 weeks. Or, you can store it in the freezer for up to a month.
Nutrition
Editor’s Note: This post was originally published on Mar 23, 2014. The post has been updated with new images and step-by-step images in April 2020.
This is a very tasty and easy to make recipe. I’ve made it thick and runny and always like it a little wetter. My partner does not eat onions but she eats green onion stalk so I substituted it with that and it was very nice, it lends a little visual texture to an otherwise unchanged recipe.
Hi Claire! We are glad to hear you enjoyed the homemade carrot ginger dressing!
Thank you very much for sharing your cooking experience and the photo with us! It looks very yummy! We LOVE it!🥰
Hi Nami. It’s been about 2 years since I bought the blender just for your recipe. It’s still my favourite go to salad dressing to have. Thanks again! I love your recipes.
Hi Anges! Aww.☺️ It’s so nice to hear that this salad dressing is your long-time favorite!
Thank you very much for your love and support! Nami and JOC team are so happy to hear you enjoyed our recipes!
Nice, i loved it, keep it up.
Hi RAVEENDRAN M K, Thank you very much for your kind feedback!
Made your dragon roll over the weekend. A big hit with all of my family!
Also made the Japanese pancakes. Very tasty with fresh fruit.
Lastly, my sister and I made the karaage chicken. What a great flavor! Will make all of these again. Fun weekend trying all these recipes! Thank you!
Hi Dianne, Wow! Thank you very much for trying many of Nami’s recipes. We are so happy to hear you and your family enjoyed all of them!
Thank you very much for your kind feedback.😊
I would like to make this dressing. Can it be made without sugar or a different type of sweetener?
Thank you
Hi Janet, How about Honey or agave? It can be made without sugar, but it may taste vinegary.🙂
I made the recipe exactly as listed, measuring everything in grams except liquid ingredients which I measured also as listed above. Unfortunately, this version is not to my taste. The background flavors are there, but the teaspoon of sesame oil absolutely over powers the other ingredients. I’m going to try it with no sesame oil at all, and perhaps with a quarter teaspoon or a half teaspoon, to see if I can get the right blend. Thanks for the recipe though!
Hi James! Thank you very much for trying this recipe and for your honest feedback! We hope you can adjust the sesame oil amount to your liking and enjoy this recipe.🙂
I’m wondering if the proportion of oil to vinegar should be reversed — ¼ cup rice vinegar to ½ cup oil? As written, it makes an extremely acidic dressing, even when adjusting for salt and sugar.
Hi Debra! Thank you very much for trying this recipe. The recipe’s amounts are correct, and as you mentioned, it is more on the acidy dressing. Please make sure to use rice vinegar (other kinds of vinegar can be too acidic) and adjust the vinegar amount to your liking.🙂
This recipe immediately became one of the standard dressings we eat at home. We love the bright, lively, balanced flavor and vivid color. The fact that it’s much lower fat than a European/American style dressing is a big bonus too, and we definitely don’t feel like it’s missing – the miso and pureed veggies give it plenty of body. The only change I make is adding half the amount of onion. Thanks so much!
Hi Mathan!
Awwwww…. Thank you very much!
We are so happy to hear you and your family enjoyed this dressing.
Thank you for trying this recipe.☺️
I just made this carrot dressing. It’s fantastic! So yum. Thank you
Hi Martine!
We are so happy to hear it was fantastic!
Thank you for trying this recipe and for your kind feedback!
Hi! I really want to make this recipe, but I only have red miso on hand. Can I use it or will it alter the flavor too much? Thanks!
Hi Darling,
The red miso usually has a more salty and strong bean taste compared to white miso. So you may want to adjust the salt and sugar amount. As for flavor, it will give you more miso taste in this dressing.
We hope this is helpful.
I do not have miso. Is there a substitute.
Hi Jo,
Unfortunately, there is no substitute for the flavor of miso. 😞
How about Wafu dressing? https://www.justonecookbook.com/wafu-dressing-japanese-salad-dressing/
This recipe has gotten my daughter to start eating salad so it is a family favorite. I’m wondering if it can be frozen so we can make big batches ahead of time and freeze in quantities we can eat within a few days?
Hi Cindy,
Thank you so much for trying this recipe and for your kind feedback. We’re so glad to hear you and your family enjoyed this dressing!
This dressing can be stored in an airtight container like a mason jar for up to 1 week. If you take out the portion you need and put the dressing back into the refrigerator right away, you can keep it for up to 2 weeks. You can also store it in the freezer for up to a month as noted in the recipe under “To Serve and Store”
I hope this is helpful. 🙂
Nami, this turned out absolutely perfect!! My only regret is that it is for tomorrow night’s meal and I must stare longingly at it in the fridge. I don’t know how long I’ve fiddled around on the internet looking for exactly this recipe. Thanks so very much.
Hi Valerie! I’m so happy to hear that you enjoyed this recipe and thank you so much for your kind feedback. It meant so much to me! 🙂
Delicious! So happy I found this recipe. Maybe even better than restaurant dressing!
Hi Carly! Thank you so much for trying this recipe! So happy to hear you enjoyed it. 🙂
Hi Nami, this dressing is amazing! It definitely gave a brand new identity to my salad. As there weren’t sesame oil and rice vinegar in my kitchen I used tahini and apple vinegar instead. Now I have to go to grocery store to buy missing ingredients and make the original recipe! 🙂
Hi Anna! Thank you so much for your kind feedback! Glad substitutions worked! 🙂