Many commercial salad dressings drown your fresh, delicious and nutritious food in water and corn syrup.  Not only do they waste your money, but they convert your salad to a wolf in sheep’s clothing. 

This morning, I stopped at the local supermarket to look at the ingredient lists on four popular brands of salad dressing.  You will be very interested to learn what I discovered.  The first product I picked up was Wishbone Italian dressing.  Its first ingredient is water.  Seems like a very expensive way to buy water.  And surprising, too, given that Italian dressing is traditionally made from olive oil and vinegar.  Not this Italian dressing, though.  After the water, its ingredient list contains soybean and canola oil, distilled vinegar, sugar, salt, dehydrated garlic and onion and red bell pepper, maltodextrin, xantham gum, spices, autolyzed yeast extract, EDTA, natural flavor, lemon juice concentrate, caramel color, and annatto, which colors the dressing yellow, more like olive oil, which it does not contain.

The second product I picked up was Hidden Valley Fat-Free Ranch.  Like the Wishbone Italian, the ingredient list starts with water, followed by corn syrup, maltodextrin, sugar, and modified food starch (usually made from corn or wheat, whichever is cheaper at the time of purchase).  These are four different ways to say “sugar,” which, of course, significantly raises the amount of insulin required to metabolize your food.  The 6th ingredient is protein-rich buttermilk, of which there must be very little since the nutrition information lists 0 grams of protein.

Next I checked Kraft Catalina, a sweet, French-style dressing.  The first ingredient was high-fructose corn syrup, followed by water and tomato paste (called “tomato puree”), soybean oil, vinegar, salt and 12 more ingredients that constitute less than 2% of the total.  These include red dye 40, yellow dye 6, and blue dye 1, which probably account for the unusually deep orange color of the product.  Two tablespoons of Catalina salad dressing contain 10 grams of carbohydrate, most of which (9 grams) is sugar.  It’s a lot like pouring pancake syrup on your salad.

The last dressing I examined was Kraft Balsamic Vinegar.  Once again, the first ingredient was water.  Then came “vegetable oils” (further defined as “canola, soybean, extra virgin olive oil”),  followed by “balsamic vinegar” (wine vinegar, grape juice, water), and the usual long list of ingredients each of which constitutes less than 2% of the total.  I  have a much better, simpler recipe.  Mix 3 tbsp. of olive oil with 2 tbsp. balsamic vinegar.  Toss over washed lettuce greens just before serving.

So what’s the alternative?  I picked out a few of my favorite salad dressing recipes for you to try.  The directions for all of them are the same:  Combine ingredients in a small bowl, mix or whisk until blended, and refrigerate.  All of these dressings are flavorful and nutritious.  If you are sensitive to salt, just skip it.  There is plenty of flavor with or without the salt.

1) Balsamic Vinaigrette (a bit more involved than the very simple recipe above) is made with 1/4 cup balsamic vinegar, 1/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil, 2 tbsp lemon juice, 2 tsp soy sauce, and 3 garlic cloves mashed to a pulp with 1/2 tsp coarse salt (use a fork or a mortar & pestle), and fresh ground pepper to taste.

2) Tahini Salad Dressing (one of my long-time favorite salad dressings, and really delicious on a Lebanese salad composed of 2 small diced cucumbers, 2 small diced tomatoes, 3 diced radishes, 1 sliced green onion, 10 sliced mint leaves, and 1/3 bunch parsley, chopped) is made with 1 minced clove of garlic, 3/4 cup tahini (sesame seed paste, available everywhere), 1/4 cup lemon juice, and 2 tbsp olive oil, with salt to taste.  This dressing will only stay fresh for a few days.

3) Classic French Vinaigrette is made with 1/2 cup white vinegar, 1 tbsp honey, 1 tbsp prepared Dijon-style mustard, 1/2 tsp ground black pepper, 1 tsp salt, 2 tsp minced garlic, and 1 cup olive oil.  Adding 2-4 drops hot sauce is also an option, although it will no longer be a classic french vinaigrette.

Try one or more of these and let me know what you think.