How Ranch Salad Dressing Became #1 in America
Did you know that "Ranch" was invented by a Black plumbing contractor?
Homemade Ranch Dressing
Issue #163 Friday Funday October 28, 2022
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When you are asked, “What is your favorite salad dressing?” Do you answer “Ranch!” If so, you agree with the majority of Americans, because “Ranch” became the best-selling salad dressing in 1992 when it overtook Italian.
The primary recipe for ranch dressing includes mayonnaise, buttermilk, salt, garlic, onion, mustard, chives, parsley, dill, pepper, and paprika.
Ranch dressing was initially invented by a Black plumbing contractor in Alaska who made it for his work crew.
Wait! What?
Steve Henson and his wife Gayle, inventors of Hidden Valley Ranch Salad Dressing
Five Fun Facts About Ranch Salad Dressing
Steve Henson (1918–2007) was a plumbing contractor originally from Nebraska who moved with his wife Gayle to Anchorage, Alaska in 1949 to work as a plumbing contractor. After three years, in 1952, Henson’s plumbing business was so successful that he was able to retire at age 35 and he and his wife moved to Santa Barbara, California.
In 1956, Henson purchased the Sweetwater Ranch in San Marcos Pass, California. The Sweetwater Ranch was a type of bed and breakfast and Henson thought that now he had something else to occupy his time. After the purchase, Henson renamed his property the Hidden Valley Ranch. Does that name sound familiar?
Henson’s salad dressing was part of the menu at the Hidden Valley Ranch, and it became so popular that he started selling it commercially to other nearby establishments, and by 1957, Henson was also selling a packaged mix to make at home to local stores. He also sold the packages by mail for 75¢ each. The Hidden Valley Ranch was the corporate headquarters for the administration, manufacturing, and warehousing of his product, which he named “Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing.”
By the early 1970s, the Hensons incorporated the company as “Hidden Valley Ranch Food Products, Inc.” and opened a factory to manufacture his ranch dressing in a large enough volume to distribute to supermarkets in the Southwest and later nationwide.
In October 1972, Henson sold his Hidden Valley Ranch brand to the Clorox Corporation for $8 million (more than $54 million today)and he again retired, this time as a multi-millionaire.
The tens of millions of parents who went crazy in the 1980s and 1990s buying the “Elmo” dolls based on the Sesame Street character probably didn’t know that Black puppeteer Kevin Clash was the human actor and voice for Elmo. Do we wonder what they would have thought if they knew “Elmo” was Black?
What would the hundreds of millions of Americans who enjoy ranch dressing do if they knew that the #1 salad dressing was invented by a Black man who named the product after an actual ranch in California that he owned?
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What is your favorite salad dressing? Let us know in the comments.
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Good one!