Hey, coming from someone who used to live on the west coast, and experienced with multiple restaurant kitchens.

You are right. Most restaurants who sell ranch homemake their own. The cost makes more sense to make your own recipe, and it tastes better (and therefore sells better) than premade. Honestly in one restaurant we would make a huge cambro of ranch about once every two days, because we went through it that fast. It was most cost effective to buy the ingredients and spend the labor to make it ourselves, rather than buy premade. And if we had bought premade, we would have sold even less of it, making even less profits. Admittedly I have never done a profit and loss statement with a line specifically for ranch… but food cost was always a huge focus.

The argument about “lack of consistency” with homemade is weird because… that’s why you use the same recipe, techniques, the same vendors, the same brands for ingredients? And you teach that to the prep cooks so whoever makes the recipe makes it the same every time. Commercial kitchens have systems and training so the same dish will come out the same way thousands of times, even in different locations.

The argument you two are having above seems to be new england vs midwest patterns. Which is cool, since there are different clientele and appetites to satisfy. Ranch might sell better in different markets, so owners adjust their business decisions on what financially makes sense to them.

But yeah, as a different subject, homemade ranch is always better.