The Worst Store-Bought Caesar Dressing Comes From This National Grocery Chain

Homemade Caesar dressing has it all; the pungency of fresh garlic, the saltiness of Parmesan, the savory hit of anchovies, and the tang of acidic lemon. Preparing it well, therefore, requires balancing its bright and punchy flavors so they sing in unison instead of competing against each other. Of course, you can skip all the hard parts and opt for a ready-made dressing that can be stashed in the fridge for salad emergencies instead. Just one word of warning: The worst store-bought option is Aldi's Simply Nature organic Caesar dressing. The loser in our ranking of 14 store-bought Caesar salad dressings, this national grocery chain offering had virtually no personality.

Despite including almost all the classic ingredients of a Caesar dressing, such as egg yolk, garlic, Worcestershire sauce, and Parmesan cheese, this product was lacking in flavor. Instead of being rich and creamy, the dressing was close to the consistency of 1% milk. It also lacked the characterful cheesy flavor of a well-made Caesar and had only a faint tang despite the presence of apple cider vinegar and concentrated lemon juice. It's possible that its mild flavor could be attributed to the absence of umami-rich anchovies, which was present in several of the other options we tried. Whatever it was, we doubt this dressing would be able to hold its own when combined with the other elements of a Caesar salad, like crisp romaine lettuce and toasty croutons, due to its indiscernible taste.

On a Reddit thread discussing the flavor of the Aldi's Caesar dressing, one shopper said "i was so excited to try this only to find out it was the nastiest dressing I've ever tasted!!" However, another commenter said "I thought it was decent enough. It doesn't have fish in it, which is why I got it. But anchovy-free Caesar dressing is probably always going to be a bit lacking compared to [the] real thing." Meanwhile several other shoppers agreed, saying they liked it as-is, triggering the original poster to question if they had just bought a bad batch or if maybe their taste buds were out of sync with the other Aldi customers' palates.

The other private label Aldi option we tried — Tuscan Garden classic Caesar dressing — fared better than the organic one and had a thicker consistency. However, it also happened to be far too salty, which is why it ranked in at number eight. Our advice is to skip Aldi altogether and opt for the winner in our taste test: the creamy Caesar with roasted garlic from Ken's Steak House Chef's Reserve. Layered with flavor, this nuanced dressing hit us with garlic first followed by a salty tang, vinegary note, and savoriness from the Parmesan cheese.