Name: Blue Cheese Buttermilk Dressing
Ingredients: 1 cup mayonnaise; 2 tablespoons buttermilk; 1 tablespoon crumbled blue cheese; ⅛ teaspoon coarse ground black pepper; ⅛ teaspoon onion powder; ⅛ teaspoon garlic powder

Why it works: Buttermilk and blue cheese work together. They rank in the top 5% of all ingredient pairs, and 42 recipes mention both. Both carry 1-octen-3-ol, which smells mushroom, earthy. The science ↓

The recipe

Time30 minutes

Ingredients

Contains: egg, milk (auto-detected from the ingredients and method; we can miss things, so check labels)

1 cup mayonnaise
2 tablespoons buttermilk
1 tablespoon crumbled blue cheese
⅛ teaspoon coarse ground black pepper
⅛ teaspoon onion powder
⅛ teaspoon garlic powder

Directions

Make the dressing

Mix all ingredients together by hand in a small bowl until smooth.

Chill and serve

Cover and chill for 30 minutes before serving.

Recipe from the Recipes Wiki (Fandom).

This recipe comes from the Recipes Wiki on Fandom and is licensed CC BY-SA 4.0. Our formatting and summaries are shared under the same licence.

Steps grouped into stages for easier reading; the method is the source's own.

Explore the science

The flavor team

The pairs that carry this dish. Each one is judged two ways: how much aroma chemistry they share, and how many recipes mention both.

Buttermilk + blue cheesetop 5% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together42 recipes

Shared aroma: 1-octen-3-ol (mushroom, earthy).
Onion + garlictop 1% of all pairs

Aroma overlapstrong

Mentioned together29,030 recipes

Shared aroma: furaneol (caramel, strawberry).
Pepper + garlictop 5% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together27,044 recipes

Shared aroma: beta-phellandrene (minty, terpene).
Pepper + oniontop 6% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together68,463 recipes

Shared aroma: 2-isopropyl-3-methoxypyrazine (earthy, pea).
Blue cheese + peppertop 7% of all pairs

Aroma overlapmoderate

Mentioned together370 recipes

Shared aroma: ethyl 2-methylbutyrate (fruity, apple).

Ranks compare each pair with 20,000 random ingredient pairs on CompKitchen. How we score pairs

What each ingredient does

Mayonnaise: Provides the creamy base and rich fat that gives the dressing its body.
Buttermilk: Thins the mayonnaise to a pourable consistency and adds a mild tang.
Blue cheese: Adds the sharp, salty, funky flavor that defines the dressing.

Flavor stand-ins for the onion

How well each one fits the dish's main ingredients (buttermilk, blue cheese, pepper, garlic):

Chiveabout as good a flavor fit
Onionthe original
Tomatoabout as good a flavor fit
Potatoabout as good a flavor fit

Fit is the average pairing score against buttermilk, blue cheese, pepper, garlic. Candidates are from the same food group and used in at least 100 recipes. This compares flavor only: it does not check the job the ingredient does in the dish (bulk, moisture, acidity, structure).

“What each ingredient does” and “The step that matters” were written by Claude from this recipe’s own method and reviewed in samples by CompKitchen.