Hi everyone. It’s time to go back to the basics on Ambitious Kitchen. Over the next month or so, I’m going to be introducing a few simple recipes you can use over and over again. First up: this deliciously creamy homemade sesame ginger dressing!
This easy ginger dressing is officially my new favorite chicken marinade, salad dressing and even a delicious stir fry sauce. I came up with it one night after marinating chicken thighs for grilling, and then the next day I made it again and threw it in an upcoming brussels salad recipe.
Am I addicted? Yup.
Ingredients in sesame ginger dressing
- Toasted sesame oil: this recipe calls for toasted sesame oil, which has much more distinctive flavor than regular sesame oil. I highly recommend using it in this recipe. MY FAVORITE.
- Olive oil: to neutralize the flavor, I also used olive oil in this dressing. Extra virgin olive oil is best!
- Soy sauce: you have the option of using reduced sodium soy sauce, tamari (gluten free soy sauce), or coconut aminos in this recipe.
- Rice vinegar: my favorite vinegar to use in this ginger dressing is always rice vinegar. It’s a little more traditional and mild in flavor.
- Pure maple syrup: every dressing needs a little bit of sweetness to help cut the acidity. If you don’t want to use pure maple syrup, you can use 1 tablespoon of honey, but I think the maple offers a better flavor profile in this recipe.
- Garlic: you know, because garlic makes the world go round.
- Ginger: this is the star of the recipe, and freshly grated ginger is best.
- Tahini: adding tahini to the recipe helps to create a creaminess. It’s completely optional, but I do recommend it!
How to make sesame ginger dressing
You can make this dressing a few different ways! The best part though? IT’S EASY.
- Option 1: simply add all ingredients to a medium bowl and whisk together until smooth and emulsified.
- Option 2: the second way is to add the ingredients to a mason jar or this AWESOME salad shaker and shake to combine.
- Option 3: the final way to make the dressing is to add everything to a blender or food processor and blend until smooth.
Ways to use sesame ginger dressing
- Use this dressing recipe as a chicken, tofu or salmon marinade. Place protein in a large bowl, then pour dressing over the top. Allow chicken to marinade for up to 8 hours, then pan fry, bake or grill. Yum!
- Use it as salad dressing. We have a fabulous recipe coming up that uses this dressing, but you can use it on just about anything — think quinoa salads, coleslaw, crunchy cabbage salads or even broccoli salad.
- A delicious stir fry sauce. Try it with this kung pao brussels stir fry or on any stir fry of choice. Use a tablespoon or cornstarch or arrowroot starch if you want to thicken it up while it heats.
We hope you love this delicious sesame ginger dressing as much as we do! Don’t forget to check out our other healthy salad dressings.
If you make this easy sesame ginger dressing recipe, please be sure to leave a comment below and rate the recipe so we know how you liked it. Thanks for your readership. xo!
Ambitious Kitchen
Cookbook
125 Ridiculously Good For You, Sometimes Indulgent, and Absolutely Never Boring Recipes for Every Meal of the Day
Sesame Ginger Dressing
Ingredients
- 2 tablespoons toasted sesame oil
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 2 tablespoons reduced sodium soy sauce (or sub coconut aminos)
- 2-3 tablespoons rice vinegar
- 1 ½ tablespoons pure maple syrup
- 2 cloves garlic, finely minced
- 1 tablespoon freshly minced ginger
- Optional if you want a creamy dressing: add 1 tablespoon tahini or cashew butter
Instructions
- Make the dressing by whisking together the following in a medium bowl or shaking in a mason jar: sesame oil, olive oil, soy sauce, rice vinegar, maple syrup, garlic and fresh ginger. If you want a creamier dressing, add in a tablespoon of tahini or cashew butter.
Nutrition
97 comments
This looks absolutely delicious
Thanks Sheila! The flavors are amazing 🙂
Yum! This will become a staple recipe for sure!
Such a great go-to!
I’ve been on a “make my own salad dressing” kick for a few months now. Do you know if this will keep well in the fridge? I know olive oil doesn’t always do well cold.
Love that! And yes you can keep this in the fridge and give it a quick stir or shake before drizzling it.
What’s that gorgeous salad you’re pouring it onto?
This one! 🙂
Excellent! This is my go-to salad dressing and I always have it in the fridge for a quick salad. Like Maria, I also would love to know which fabulous salad you are pouring it on.
Love that! Try it on this salad 🙂 https://www.ambitiouskitchen.com/cashew-crunch-shredded-brussels-sprouts-salad/
This is the BEST Asian salad I have ever had or made.
Made this for dinner and LOVED it. Best EVER!
This dressing will be always on hand for my salads.
I would give this ten stars if I could.
Amazing!! So happy to hear that. Thank you for your comment!
I just made this for my lunch salad tomorrow. So tasty! But mine is not as creamy as yours. I think my tahini was not blended enough, it is a new jar and I tried stirring it a lot but… It will be great with my salad of spinach, zoodles, spiralized carrots and chicken.
Love it! Everyone’s tahini is a little bit different, so you might have to adjust the amount a bit depending on what consistency you want. I’m sure it will be delicious with your salad 🙂
Your dressings are always my go to! Love this so much! I added tahini and its great, also used coconut aminos!
Amazing!! So happy to hear that. Love this with tahini.
I made this dressing tonight and absolutely love it. It is so easy to make. I put it on salad and can think of a lot of ways to uses. It would be a great marinade for tofu. That’s what I’ll try next. I’m going to have to keep myself from grabbing a spoonful here and there. Thanks so much for the recipe.
Amazing! Such a good idea to use it as a tofu marinade – I’ll have to do that next 🙂 Glad you enjoyed!
Made it! loved it! thanks for the great recipes. the recipes I have made from your site have been spot on! I added 1 over the top tahini like you suggested.
Tried the recipe. LOVED that it was sooooo easy and soooo yummy!! I used sunbutter because it’s what I had. Worked wonderfully!!
Whoo hoo! So glad you loved it 🙂
Monique, I can’t thank you enough for this recipe. I’m a big fan of Sesame ginger dressing and tried all of the store-bought sesame ginger dressings. Nothing satisfied me. Always feel something is missing. Then I found this recipe and tried my own, God; it’s unbelievably tasty. Thank you!!!
Tahini is the game changer. I’m in love with this recipe. Thanks again. I owed you a lot!!!
Hi Lily! Thanks so much for your note. I’m SO happy to hear that you’re loving this dressing! Perfect for so many recipes 🙂 Enjoy!
Yum this was great! I used it to top a Buddha bowl (brown rice, roasted veggies, and roasted macadamia nuts. Yum!!)
Love that idea!! So good.
Trying this on my broccoli slaw with dried cranberries and pecans.
Sounds delicious!
Just made it as listed and it was perfect. Literally 5 minutes. Delicious. It’s a keeper for sure. Thanks!
Perfect! So happy to hear that.
Incredible! Used for a large spinach/greens salad with seared ahi tuna on top. Paired perfectly.. looking forward to using this again!
That sounds amazing! Great idea 🙂 Glad you enjoyed!
So good. Fresh, delicious, full of huge umami flavor. This is a keeper. Use the Tahini. It makes all the difference. I didn’t have toasted sesame oil so I used regular. No problem.
One of my favorites! Glad you loved it!
Monique is just amazing I love her recipes
Thank you
Thanks so much!
Incredible recipe. So yummy I could eat it on everything!!
So happy to hear that!
Love, Love, Love this recipe, thank you!
So happy to hear that!
This was perfection! So easy and fast but full of flavour. I tossed it with farm stand greens that I was servicing with grilled maple, soy and ginger salmon and this dressing paired perfectly. I omitted the garlic only because I didn’t want to overpower the fish. Thank you so much for sharing!!!
Perfect! Glad you enjoyed!
The MOST delicious dressing! Making it again today, but will double the recipe amount so I don’t go into withdrawal! 😉
So happy you love it!
I never leave reviews for the recipes I try. But THIS ISH RIGHT HERE!!!!! SOOOOOO freaking delicious. This will be a constant in my refrigerator for now on. 🙏🏾🙏🏾🙏🏾 I used the coconut aminos instead of soy sauce and cashew butter instead of tahini. I’m impressed!!!
Amazing!! So happy you enjoyed 🙂
Very tasty! Easy to make and was a great dressing for my Asian chicken salad.
Absolutely! Glad you enjoyed!
I have made this dressing numerous times and absolutely love it. I made an alteration but kept the basic recipe. Instead of rice vinegar I use Sicilian Lemon White Balsamic vinegar. Also I further emulsify the dressing using my mini Ninja instead of just whisking to further blend.
Perfect! So glad you love this one!
This is salad week at our house thanks to these yummy recipes! This was another hit for our family and will be used again!
Amazing! I’m so glad 🙂
I love this dressing, it’s great on salads! I subbed rice vinegar for lime juice, worked out totally fine!
Perfect! I’m glad that worked out well 🙂
I have made this several times. I have subed out vinegars (white wine, apple cider) with what I had
on hand. Blend wisk or shake doesn’t matter. Soooo good. It’s my go to. My friends dig it too!
Thanks!
Love it! So versatile 🙂
It was awesome dressing, I know I’ll be using it alot!!
So glad you liked it!
Fast and easy, tastes great over asian salad with salmon!
Absolutely! Glad you like it 🙂
This was really delicious. I use coconut aminos in place of soy sauce but then added a little soy sauce at the end. 3 tablespoons of vinegar was good because I found it needed a bit more acid.
Perfect! This one’s great for customizing, too.
Wonderful recipe! I use it a marinade for chicken and mushroom rice bowls. I omit the garlic and use almond butter instead of tahini. Does anyone think that substituting honey for maple syrup would work? I am fresh out.
Love that! Honey should work but you’ll likely need a bit less because honey is sweeter.
Thank you for sharing this life-changing dressing with the world! It makes my salads so much better.
Aw thank you! I’m so happy you love it so much!
Absolutely delicious! I used it in a quinoa salad with lots of toasted nuts and seeds, greens, celery, red onion and fresh coriander. i didnt have rice vinegar (but have now bought to try for the next time) so used apple cider vinegar. i’m going to marinate some tofu in it tonight to have with noodles and cant wait to try it 🙂 I will be recommending this recipe to all who will listen. Thank you!
That salad sounds incredible! I’m so happy you loved it. I bet it would be amazing with the tofu and noodles, too!!
excellent combination of sweet and savory
Thanks, Jane! So glad you loved it 🙂
Loved this recipe!! And this site. Lots of goodies!! Im gluten free, dairy free, sugar free and always struggle to find new things to make. This recipe was yummm!
Thanks so much, Candice!! SO happy you loved it 🙂
Such a good simple recipe! Made the dressing for low calorie poke bowls and was such a hit and took about two minutes to make. Thanks for making such delicious recipes that are so easy for busy people!!
Love that! Things one’s perfect with so many recipes.
I have made this several times. I triple the recipe. But it only stays fresh about 4-5 days in refrigerator. I can’t ever go back to bottled dressing again. Thank you for recipe
This is absolutely amazing!!! I love Asian Ginger dressing, which I normally buy in the store. I won’t be doing that anymore. This is the best ginger dressing I have ever tasted. This is my staple dressing because nothing else can beat the taste of this dressing. Thank you so much for providing this recipe.
This dressing is soooooo good. I made it two weeks ago and have been making it every week since. Thanks so much! Such a staple for salads!
Just made this dressing and it’s AMAZING; the flavours are perfectly balanced. Used honey instead of maple syrup bc that’s what I had on hand. Definitely making this again!
Amazing!
This dressing is AMAZING. I used only 1 Tbs low sodium tamari and omitted the garlic. Dont skip the tahini! and I added a tiny bit of hot yuzu for spice…
YUM! SO good, glad you’re loving this recipe ❤️
What salad is pictured in this post?
love the sesame ginger dressing. I wanted something light and spicy for kelp noodle salad rather than peanut. I was liberal with the ginger and dressed with chives as I have a “no garlic” friend. Delicious on green salad too. Thank you!
Ahh love this so much! Glad you found this recipe and it turned out great for you!
I love the look of the recipe. But I would really like to be able to print a simplified version. I may be too “challenged”. It was going to be 4 or 6 pages
I figured it out!!? One page. Thank you
Delicious dressing and easy to whip up!
YUM! So glad this turned out great for you!
The recipe is delicious and healthy, lots of prep work which is something I’m not used to. I would make this again, however I wrote the recipe on a recipe card because I absolutely hate that there are so many adds that continually pop up while I’m trying to read and the page constantly jumps around. Overall very frustrating.
So sorry to hear that the page was jumping! We’re constantly working to improve the user experience here and have passed along your feedback. For any recipes you can also click “Print Recipe” in the recipe card itself to print it for later!
Hi! What is the serving size?
Hi! It’s about 1.5-2 tablespoons.
Doubled this recipe (without tahini) as a marinade for tofu which I baked until almost crispy and will use in pad Thai. Absolutely, wonderfully delicious! So balanced! So easy! Thanks so much – this is a keeper that is use time and time again!!
Love this recipe. I used some extra tahini and blended it all in a blender. Next time I’ll make a larger batch!
Perfect! Yes, this one’s great to have on hand!
This is a great recipe! I like that olive oil is used to neutralize the sesame oil, which can be too overwhelming alone. I just put smashed garlic in so there aren’t pieces of garlic everywhere and also skip the ginger. Guessing it could taste different based up the maple syrup used; mine is mild.
This is a great recipe! I just smash the garlic instead of having diced garlic everywhere. I like that olive oil is used to neutralize the sesame oil which can be strong. I also skip the ginger because it can be overwhelming.
This one’s great for customizing! Glad you like it 🙂