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Blue Cheese Dressing
Was it too much to ask for a blue cheese dressing that was thick, creamy, and actually tasted like blue cheese?
Top Pick
WinnerWish-Bone Chunky Blue Cheese Dressing
Buy at Amazon“Actually tastes like blue cheese,” many tasters noted, describing this dressing as “quite pungent but in an authentic way,” with “nice chunks of very potent cheese.” With more blue cheese than the other dressings (it’s listed three ways on its ingredient list), it had “distinctive blue [cheese] flavor without being too sweet,” was “creamy without being too thick or fatty,” and tasted “ripe and rich.”
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: Less than 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.29 for 16 oz (21 cents per oz)
“Actually tastes like blue cheese,” many tasters noted, describing this dressing as “quite pungent but in an authentic way,” with “nice chunks of very potent cheese.” With more blue cheese than the other dressings (it’s listed three ways on its ingredient list), it had “distinctive blue [cheese] flavor without being too sweet,” was “creamy without being too thick or fatty,” and tasted “ripe and rich.”
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: Less than 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.29 for 16 oz (21 cents per oz)
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What You Need to Know
Nothing dresses up a wedge of iceberg or offsets the spicy heat of Buffalo wings quite like blue cheese dressing. There are dozens of supermarket options, but we narrowed the field to seven top-selling national products from a list compiled by Chicago-based market research firm IRi. (When a company made more than one version, we chose its best seller.) We sampled the dressings with celery sticks and with Buffalo wings.
What flavor did our tasters demand from blue cheese dressing? The unmistakable sharp, salty, sour, and pungent flavor of blue cheese, naturally. Some of the dressings had plenty of rich, creamy dairy flavor but barely tasted of this distinctive cheese; these dressings, we noticed, listed buttermilk ahead of blue cheese on the label, meaning that they contained more buttermilk than cheese. Blue cheese is veined with Penicillium roquefortii, a bluish-green mold that ferments over a period of months to produce methyl ketones and free fatty acids, the compounds that create typical blue cheese taste. All the dressings contained blue cheese, but our favorite had the most, listing it three times (in slightly different forms) on its ingredient list.
As for texture, the thicker the dressing the better—runny and thin isn’t for dipping. And we preferred sizable, creamy chunks of cheese to negligible flecks. What we didn’t expect was that a shelf-stable bottle would best refrigerated products, its distinct blue cheese flavor and thick texture making it the all-around favorite.
In fact, we liked most of the shelf-stable dressings, recommending all but one. It failed because it was too sweet. With 4 grams of sugar per serving, it had the highest sugar content of all the dressings in our lineup. The sugar was listed third on its ingredient list, ahead of even the blue cheese; the rest of the dressings had 1 gram of sugar or less. The other product we can’t recommend had almost no blue cheese flavor.
Since oil is listed first on the ingredient list in every one of these dressings, naturally the type of oil also affected our rankings. All the products we liked use soybean oil. The two products we didn’t like were made with canola oil. Canola is much more highly unsaturated than soybean oil and oxidizes more rapidly, potentially creating background rancid flavors in less than six months. It can turn bad especially quickly in a clear container, which is how all the dressings are packaged, even when the bottle is still sealed. Our favorite product also adds preservatives and partially hydrogenated soybean oil, which makes it even less likely to oxidize. It’s the only dressing in our lineup with nucleotides (disodium inosinate and disodium guanylate). Wondering what they are? They intensify our tastebuds’ perception of flavor. Our top choice was well engineered for maximum flavor and texture. It’s a convenient choice next time we watch a game with a platter of Buffalo wings.
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Everything We Tested
Recommended
WinnerWish-Bone Chunky Blue Cheese Dressing
“Actually tastes like blue cheese,” many tasters noted, describing this dressing as “quite pungent but in an authentic way,” with “nice chunks of very potent cheese.” With more blue cheese than the other dressings (it’s listed three ways on its ingredient list), it had “distinctive blue [cheese] flavor without being too sweet,” was “creamy without being too thick or fatty,” and tasted “ripe and rich.”
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: Less than 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.29 for 16 oz (21 cents per oz)
“Actually tastes like blue cheese,” many tasters noted, describing this dressing as “quite pungent but in an authentic way,” with “nice chunks of very potent cheese.” With more blue cheese than the other dressings (it’s listed three ways on its ingredient list), it had “distinctive blue [cheese] flavor without being too sweet,” was “creamy without being too thick or fatty,” and tasted “ripe and rich.”
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: Less than 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.29 for 16 oz (21 cents per oz)
Marzetti Chunky Blue Cheese Dressing
This dressing was “very salty” and “pungent” with big chunks of cheese. It had a “tangy, rich” taste and a “great thick and chunky texture,” with hints of Parmesan. A few tasters thought that the vinegar came on too strong.
Oil: Soybean
Style: Refrigerated
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.69 for 15 oz (25 cents per oz)
This dressing was “very salty” and “pungent” with big chunks of cheese. It had a “tangy, rich” taste and a “great thick and chunky texture,” with hints of Parmesan. A few tasters thought that the vinegar came on too strong.
Oil: Soybean
Style: Refrigerated
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.69 for 15 oz (25 cents per oz)
Ken’s Steak House Chunky Blue Cheese Dressing
This dressing “tastes mightily of blue cheese,” with “a good balance of acidity, saltiness, [and] creaminess” and a “nice tang” that’s “not too overpowering.” But several tasters found it “thin.”
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $4.19 for 16 oz (26 cents per oz)
This dressing “tastes mightily of blue cheese,” with “a good balance of acidity, saltiness, [and] creaminess” and a “nice tang” that’s “not too overpowering.” But several tasters found it “thin.”
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $4.19 for 16 oz (26 cents per oz)
Kraft Roka Blue Cheese Anything Dressing
What’s with the name? According to a company spokesperson, “For Kraft, ‘Roka’ is indicative of the Roquefort region in France known for their characteristic blue-veined blue cheese.” That’s nice, but our tasters found this product “not particularly flavored like blue cheese.” We did, however, like its “really creamy and thick” texture and “salty, tangy” flavor.
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: Less than 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.99 for 16 oz (25 cents per oz)
What’s with the name? According to a company spokesperson, “For Kraft, ‘Roka’ is indicative of the Roquefort region in France known for their characteristic blue-veined blue cheese.” That’s nice, but our tasters found this product “not particularly flavored like blue cheese.” We did, however, like its “really creamy and thick” texture and “salty, tangy” flavor.
Oil: Soybean
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: Less than 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $3.99 for 16 oz (25 cents per oz)
Recommended with reservations
Marie’s Chunky Blue Cheese Dressing
This refrigerated product had “nice, real-tasting blue cheese chunks” and a “silky,” “thick and creamy” texture that reminded tasters of sour cream. Some found it slightly “bland,” like “ranch dressing or peppercorn Parm”—your “generic creamy, rich dressing.” With more buttermilk than blue cheese and the least sodium in the lineup, no wonder.
Oil: Soybean
Style: Refrigerated
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 0 g
Price at Time of Testing: $5.49 for 25 oz (22 cents per oz)
This refrigerated product had “nice, real-tasting blue cheese chunks” and a “silky,” “thick and creamy” texture that reminded tasters of sour cream. Some found it slightly “bland,” like “ranch dressing or peppercorn Parm”—your “generic creamy, rich dressing.” With more buttermilk than blue cheese and the least sodium in the lineup, no wonder.
Oil: Soybean
Style: Refrigerated
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 0 g
Price at Time of Testing: $5.49 for 25 oz (22 cents per oz)
Not Recommended
Litehouse Chunky Bleu Cheese Dressing & Dip
“There’s blue cheese in here?” asked one taster, who described this sample (which also had more buttermilk than blue cheese) as “too thin” and “innocuous—not the way you want blue cheese dressing.” Others compared it to “watered-down mayo” and found it too “mellow” and “not very blue cheesy.” “Can taste an ‘herb’ flavoring,” said one taster. “Is this ranch?”
Oil: Canola
Style: Refrigerated
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $4.29 for 13 oz (33 cents per oz)
“There’s blue cheese in here?” asked one taster, who described this sample (which also had more buttermilk than blue cheese) as “too thin” and “innocuous—not the way you want blue cheese dressing.” Others compared it to “watered-down mayo” and found it too “mellow” and “not very blue cheesy.” “Can taste an ‘herb’ flavoring,” said one taster. “Is this ranch?”
Oil: Canola
Style: Refrigerated
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 1 g
Price at Time of Testing: $4.29 for 13 oz (33 cents per oz)
Briannas Home Style True Blue Cheese Salad Dressing
With 4 grams of sugar, this dressing had four or more times the sugar as every other blue cheese dressing we tested. But too sweet was the least of it. We also found it “sticky,” “oily,” “greasy,” “runny and fake-tasting,” and with a “sickly” taste, “like sugar mixed with mustard.” Asked one taster, “How could you ruin Buffalo wings with this?”
Oil: Canola
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 4 g
Price at Time of Testing: $4.39 for 12 oz (37 cents per oz)
With 4 grams of sugar, this dressing had four or more times the sugar as every other blue cheese dressing we tested. But too sweet was the least of it. We also found it “sticky,” “oily,” “greasy,” “runny and fake-tasting,” and with a “sickly” taste, “like sugar mixed with mustard.” Asked one taster, “How could you ruin Buffalo wings with this?”
Oil: Canola
Style: Shelf-stable
Sugars Per 2-Tbsp Serving: 4 g
Price at Time of Testing: $4.39 for 12 oz (37 cents per oz)
*All products reviewed by America’s Test Kitchen are independently chosen, researched, and reviewed by our editors. We buy products for testing at retail locations and do not accept unsolicited samples for testing. We list suggested sources for recommended products as a convenience to our readers but do not endorse specific retailers. When you choose to purchase our editorial recommendations from the links we provide, we may earn an affiliate commission. Prices are subject to change.
Reviews You Can Trust
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See Why.