In the Japanese language, the characters for wafu are East-West. This dressing is a western-style cream based dressing with an eastern flair...hence it is known as a wafu dressing or East meets West Dressing. In short, this is a Japanese-esque recipe for salads and dipping that I've been making for over 20 years. For some reason, most savory wafu recipes (dressing or not) combine the flavors of soy and sesame oil. I actually like the combination here! The original recipe calls for making the mayonnaise from scratch and then adding the other ingredients. I prefer making this using commercial mayo because I the kids will go through quarts of the stuff on their salad. I usually double the recipe to last us a week. It's almost a crime, but very tasty to dip california rolls into this. Just do it secretly, and it'll be fine. Actually, wafu does not mean east meets west. It means Japanese style . East/west would be wayo - wa for Japanese and Yo for European or Western. Wa is the character for Japanese, and fu is the character for style . or in the style of fu is also the character for wind.