Wellness Wednesday #19: A Better Salad Dressing
I do not buy store-bought dressing. With a rare exception that you might find at Whole Foods, store-bought salad dressings are made with unhealthy vegetable oils. I am going to give you a recipe for healthy salad dressing that is quick and easy to make. It tastes good, too!
If you never read my post about unhealthy fats, click here to check it out. Vegetable oils are highly processed oils, and they are not good for us. They are very different than the natural oils that are found in plants. Even the minimally processed non-GMO, expeller-pressed vegetable oils provide too many omega-6 fats for our diet, and many of these fragile polyunsaturated oils go rancid just by sitting in their clear plastic jars for months on the store shelf.
Check out the ingredients in Hidden Valley Ranch dressing. That is a long list! Notice vegetable oil is the number one ingredient. It also contains sugar and a bunch of other stuff that you’ve probably never heard of.
Here is Kraft’s Catalina Dressing. Sugar is the number one ingredient! There is more sugar in this dressing than oil or water! It also has soybean oil and the delicious (and probably carcinogenic) Red 40 and Blue 1.
Even Newman’s Own Olive Oil and Vinegar Dressing contains unhealthy vegetable oils. They trick you into thinking that their dressing is made with olive oil instead of vegetable oil, but it is made with both. No, thank you.
Don’t be overwhelmed at the idea of making your own dressing. You can make it in about 2 minutes. It’s that easy. If we run out, the kids will make more on their own. Really, it’s not difficult.
Remember to choose an olive oil that is in a dark jar. The dark jar keeps the light out and prevents the fat from being damaged and rancidifying.
Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing
Ingredients
- ¼ cup of balsamic vinegar
- ¾ cup of olive oil
- 1 tablespoon chopped garlic
- ½ tsp sea salt
- ½ tsp black pepper
Instructions
Place all ingredients in a screw-top jar and shake to combine!
Refrigerate any unused dressing. The dressing should keep for a week or two. Take it out of the fridge a while before you’re going to use it, or you’re going to have to spoon it out of the jar. The olive oil solidifies when it’s cold.
I hope you like it!