Papa Murphy's Bleu Cheese Dressing

Papa Murphy's bleu cheese dressing is high in histamine. It contains blue cheese, which is mold-ripened and matured, and cultured buttermilk, so two separate fermented dairy components are stacked into one condiment.

Why papa murphy's bleu cheese dressing is rated high

Two of the things in this dressing are histamine drivers in their own right. Blue cheese is ripened with mold and then matured, and that maturing on a protein-rich food is the classic way histamine accumulates in cheese. Buttermilk is cultured, meaning bacteria have already worked on the milk before it ever went into the bottle. Soybean oil is in there too and sits in the moderate range. The rest of what is listed, canola oil, whey, milk, salt, and water, is quiet by comparison. When one dressing carries an aged cheese on top of a cultured dairy base, high is where it lands.

What changes your risk

• Blue cheese is the strongest driver — it is aged and mold-ripened, and that ripening is where its histamine comes from. Blending it into a dressing dilutes the flavor, not the histamine that already formed.
• The buttermilk is cultured too — the dairy base was fermented before bottling, so this dressing runs high from two directions rather than one.
• Soybean oil adds to the total — it is one of the listed components and sits at a moderate level, so it nudges the item upward rather than balancing anything out.
• Warm holding matters for a dairy dressing — this is protein-rich dairy, so a cup left sitting warm next to a hot pizza gives bacteria more room to work on top of what culturing and ripening already left.
• Nothing at the counter lowers it — the ripening and culturing happened at the supplier, and neither the kitchen nor your oven reverses histamine that has already formed.

Lower-histamine alternatives

The lower-histamine items we point to at Papa Murphy's are Chicken, Onion Mix, and Zesty Herb Blend. A creamy dipping sauce is a hard role to fill on a histamine-conscious order, and we are not naming a dressing swap here, which is a limit of this list rather than a claim that the counter has nothing lower. What is not the answer is a milder blue cheese or a lighter version of the same dressing, since a gentler take on an aged, cultured product is still aged and cultured.

How to lower the risk

Because nothing in it is published as removable and both of its main drivers, the blue cheese and the cultured buttermilk, are built into the recipe, the decision is really about the dressing itself rather than any customization. Keep it cold rather than letting a cup sit out warm beside a hot pizza, since it is a dairy product. And build the rest of the order around lower items like Chicken, Onion Mix, and Zesty Herb Blend so the dressing is not landing on top of other aged or cultured dairy in the same meal.

Common questions

Is bleu cheese dressing milder than plain blue cheese for histamine?

Not in a way that changes the rating. The dressing thins the cheese with oil and water, but it also brings in cultured buttermilk, so it still lands high.

Does keeping the dressing cold stop histamine from forming?

Cold storage slows bacteria, which is worth doing with any dairy, but it cannot undo histamine that formed while the blue cheese ripened and the buttermilk cultured.

Is the oil in it a problem?

The soybean oil in this dressing sits at a moderate level, so it contributes. The blue cheese and the cultured buttermilk are the bigger drivers.

Is there a lower-histamine dipping option at Papa Murphy's?

We are not naming a sauce swap on this page. The lower-histamine items we do point to are Chicken, Onion Mix, and Zesty Herb Blend, and that list is filtered rather than the full menu.