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Cilantro Verde Sauce is our go to sauce for everything Mexican! Drizzle it over burritos or tacos, dip chips in it, or use it as a salad dressing. Tangy and delicious fresh flavor!
Featured with this Recipe
Our favorite “Green” Sauce
Cilantro Verde Sauce, or more popularly called Green Sauce, is the most used sauce in our house! We always have a jar in the refrigerator, and I have to replenish it at least once a week because it goes super fast. It’s easy to make, easy to store, and so versatile you can drizzle it over just about anything from salads to burritos to tacos to nachos. We are constantly dipping tortilla chips into it!
Ingredients in this Recipe
- salsa verde – we use Herdez green salsa verde
- Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing mix (1 packet)
- bunch fresh cilantro – washed, stems removed, and chopped
- sour cream – you can use regular, light, or a dairy free
- mayonnaise – we prefer Best Foods or Hellmans Mayo
- minced garlic
- fresh lime – juiced
- cumin
Suggestions for Cilantro Verde Sauce
- This sauce can be served warm or cold! Warm it up and smother it over burritos, or cold as a sauce over tacos or as a chip dip.
- Pile a plate high with greens and veggies and drizzle over them for a spicy sweet salad. Add grilled chicken for extra protein.
- Cilantro Verde Sauce is delicious over fish, shrimp, steak or chicken.
- For a lightened up our version from the original, use Greek yogurt and light sour cream in place of the mayonnaise and sour cream.
- Cilantro gives this dressing a beautiful deep green color and vivid flavor but doesn’t add any spice, so don’t worry about this sauce being too spicy.
- For some heat, add a dash or two of Tabasco sauce or sriracha.
- Not a fan of cilantro? You can substitute flat leaf Italian parsley or fresh basil for the cilantro. The sauce will have the same gorgeous green color but will taste completely different.
- To store, keep in a tightly-sealed container in the refrigerator. It’ll stay nice and fresh for over a week.
- If you don’t have a great blender, a food processor works as well.
Frequently Asked Questions
They are actually very different. Both are green but chimichurri is made up of parsley, oregano, shallots, oil, and vinegar.
Aji Verde is a Peruvian green hot sauce. It has ingredients like fresh cilantro, aji amarillo, huacatay and cheese. It is a creamy and spicy sauce typically served with pollo a la brasa. It is also great with roasted vegetables, chicken or bread.
It has some similar flavors but the recipe is different. We have amazing copycat recipes for both the Cafe Rio Tomatillo Ranch and the Cilantro Lime Vinaigrette.
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More Delicious Mexican Recipes
This sauce elevates just about anything you serve it with! From burritos to tacos to salads to nachos, we could put this sauce on anything. Try some of these favorite recipes with this sauce as a side:
- Cheesy Grilled Mexican Chicken and Rice
- Mexican Lasagna
- Easy Chicken Tacos
- Crock Pot Salsa Verde Chicken
- Honey Lime Chicken Enchiladas
- Spicy Shrimp Tacos
- Pork Chile Verde Recipe
How to Make Cilantro Verde Sauce
Cilantro Verde Sauce
Equipment
- Blendtec Blender
Ingredients
- 14 ounces salsa verde we use Herdez (2 small cans)
- 1 ounce Hidden Valley Ranch Dressing mix (1 packet)
- 1 bunch fresh cilantro washed and stems removed
- 1 cup sour cream
- 1 cup mayonnaise (we prefer Best Foods or Hellmans)
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic
- 1 small lime juiced
- 1/4 tsp cumin
Instructions
- Put all the ingredients in a blender and blend until smooth.
- Keep refrigerated.
Notes
Recipe Notes:
To make the lighter version of this recipe:- Sub the Mayonnaise for Greek Yogurt
- Sub the Sour Cream for Light Sour Cream
So easy and delicious!! Love using this sauce on many recipes!!
Made this to serve over taco salads for the week and it was just delicious! Super flavorful with a creamy texture. Will definitely make again!
Thank you so much for sharing this amazing cilantro verde sauce recipe! Will surely have this again! It’s really easy to make and it tasted so delicious! Highly recommended!
Absolutely wonderful! My daughters will love it as my husband and I do. Made it just like according to your recipe. Reminds me of the sauce at Chuy’s!
First off, I sort of made this recipe and it was fantastic. Here’s why I say sort of.. I didn’t measure anything and made subs based on what I had.
Herdez Salsa Verde comes in 7 ounce cans. Close enough.
Buttermilk Ranch was in 1 ounce packet. Eyeballed it.
Cilantro? I just threw a bunch in.
Greek Yogurt? Nope. I replaced it with more sour cream since it’s what I had at home.
Minced garlic? Nope also. Powdered will have to do. It’s all I have.
Fresh lime juice? Nope also. From a bottle. Didn’t measure.
Dash of tabasco? Nope. Didn’t have any. I did have some jalapeno powder for heat.
Whatever, it was awesome. I will throw it on everything. I’m not going to measure this recipe from now on either.
How long will this sauce keep in the refrigerator?
I would say up to a week…
Love , love this sauce!! Use it on everything….as a dip for chips, finishing sauce for Mexican food, salad dressing. So easy to make!
Thank you for the comment! So glad that you like it– I’m right there with you… we put it on everything! 😀
This sounds fantastic! Looking forward to grocery shopping tomorrow as I have a few pf your recepies written down! Yay! ????
I will be making this soon as we love Mexican!