Catholicism and Blue Cheese

Two great things that taste great together? No, just the curious link between guilt and food. Here's the story:

Recently, I've been on a steakhouse kick: red meat for sure, but mostly that old-timey
salad of iceberg lettuce wedge and blue cheese dressing. My
sister-in-law makes a kick ass blue cheese dressing. She wrote the
recipe down for me once (I think it included soy sauce and orange
juice), but I've seen her cook and she is more of a Jackson Pollock

than a Piet Mondrian:

lots of improv and tasting, to hell with the rules. Consequently, mine has never tasted the same.
I
set out to make a new batch and figured I'd go to the gold standard:
"America's Test Kitchen" cookbook. For those not familiar, this is a
book that takes a standard recipe and tests it hundreds of times in any
permutation until it's perfect. I don't always use it because I'm often
too lazy to go through all the extra steps it will list to get that
perfection, but when I want something I know will be great, it's the
source. Plus, their blue cheese dressing recipe was easy: mash some
blue cheese, buttermilk and garlic, add sour cream and mayonnaise.
Great! Except I didn't have buttermilk, so I used regular milk, and
then realized I didn't have sour cream, so I used low fat plain yogurt,
and then crap! No mayonnaise. So I just added a little more yogurt. Let
it sit for a bit, break open the iceberg and .....it's great. Really
great. And it gets better the more it sits. So I patted myself on the
back for a job well done, "Iron Chef" style, felt slightly guilty
(Catholic upbringing) for eating blue cheese dressing at two out of
three meals a day, but put it to the back of my mind. Until itoccurred
to me: this dressing is healthy! Lots of happy yogurt cultures! Low fat
dairy! Calcium! And a little penicillin from the blue cheese!

Try it. You'll never feel bad again.

6 oz. blue cheese, crumbled
1/2c. milk
1 minced garlic clove
1/2 and little more of yogurt (plain)
2 TBSP rice vinegar (white will work too)
1/2 tsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
pepper.

Mash the cheese, milk and garlic to make a paste. Add everything else. Eat and feel virtuous.