I disagree that’s it’s an “unfair comparison.” It’s certainly not a 1:1, but to help someone with absolutely no bearing on what ranch dressing is understand, I think it’s a decent shorthand.
It’s like if someone from Mexico asked what sriracha is and I replied, “it’s like the Thai version of Tapatío.” Is it perfect? No, there’s way more nuance, but it gets them most of the way toward understanding.
Fair enough. I’m leery of easy comparisons, because in my mind, they’re such radically different things. It’s like saying a Wiener Schnitzel is basically like American fried chicken. I mean, I guess? They’re both meat, they’re both battered and fried. But they’re drastically different foods.
Shit, I’ll go further: my pet peeve is crème brûlée. It’s egg yolk, heavy cream, sugar and vanilla. That’s it. But every chef at every restaurant has this compulsion to fuck with the recipe; their crème brûlée has lemon, or strawberry, or sage or cayenne or some shit… just leave the fucking recipe alone! Stop trying to be edgy or special! They always have to fuck with the recipe, and it drives me nuts, because it invariably ruins an already perfect recipe. You add shit to a perfect recipe and it can only get less perfect. So, IMO, my crème brûlée, is not like the crème brûlée at that restaurant: not because I’m some awesome chef, but because crème brûlée is a stupid easy recipe that’s almost impossible to screw up… unless you add fucking jalepeño or some such crap.