Salad Dressings

Losing 35 pounds seemed like it was going to be impossible a year ago.   I really didn’t want to work out or eat right, but I knew I needed to lose the weight.  After 8 months of trying to lose the weight I had lost 35 pounds just in time for Thanksgiving and Christmas.  How did I achieve this you ask; well, it will take a few posts to write the whole story.  I will cover the main motivations and factors in losing the weight and how I did it each step of the way.  Who knows, maybe I will get myself motivated to do it again as I still have about 30 pounds to lose to get to my target weight.

This offering from Kraft distinguishes itself by the fact that it is not just a low-fat dressing but completely fat free while retaining the flavor of a regular Italian dressing. It has the typical thinness of an oil-based dressing with the different bits of light, dark, and red particles floating in it. The smell is vinegary (as could be expected) and the taste is strong enough to cause a little pucker on the first bite. But this dressing has another factor that makes it a reason to choose it and that is because it is low calorie along with being fat free. It only has 16 calories per serving which is the normal 2 tablespoons.

The list of ingredients contains mostly the expected ones such as water, vinegar as the largest percentage but then adds high fructose corn syrup which is not always present. After these comes salt and then less than 2% of the following ingredients; dried garlic, soybean oil (this is new also), garlic, modified food starch, xanthan gum, dried onions, dried red peppers, spice , yellow 5, yellow 6 (what are these?), potassium sorbate and calcium disodium EDTA as preservatives. It offers very little in the way of nutrition, however, but it does have a couple of drawbacks; first, it contains 2gs of sugar (which is not terrible) but second, it contains a whopping 480 mg of sodium or 20% of the daily recommended value. This alone lowers the overall rating one point on my scale, but may make little difference if sodium is not a problem for you.

This dressing is a good choice if your preference leans toward an Italian style dressing. It has a lot going for it – mainly the fact that it is fat free and low calorie. It has a full-bodied taste and typical texture and appearance. The only drawback I find is the large amount of sodium in it and a small after-taste which is not especially pleasant but not too bad either.

Taste Rating = 5

Overall Rating = 4

Style Category = Italian

Fat Category = fat free

Calorie Category = low calorie

Nutritional Category = none

Sodium Category = high

Normally I am not an Italian dressing lover – even a full-calorie version, however this one is a pretty good one. The smell is not extremely strong but the flavor is full-bodied and smells like basil and oil. It is somewhat thin like all Italian dressings are but this one is full of suspended particles included light-colored ones (probably the Romano cheese, dark ones (probably the basil), and some larger chunks (which appear to be red peppers). There are enough of these to make me feel like the dressing really includes them although I cannot pick out the distinctive tastes.

Once again, this product calls itself “Lite” by comparing it to its regular dressing. It claims it has “60% Less Fat 60% Fewer Calories” and advertises that it has “still only 1g carbs per serving”. I don’t know why it used the word “still” unless it has recently changed the ingredients. It also compares itself to its regular version stating this has 5g of Fats vs. 15g and calories of 50 vs. 130 so I guess this proves it is a light version.

It contains a list of ingredients that is much more extensive that the ones I have reviewed so far. The list is water, distilled vinegar, vegetable oil (soybean and/or canola), Romano cheese (cultured milk, salt, enzymes), salt, and that it contains 2% or less of high fructose corn syrup, dried garlic, dried red bell pepper, dried onion, basic, spices, lemon juice concentrate, xanthan gum, annatto and turmeric, beta carotene, potassium sorbate and calcium disodium EDTA as preservatives. It is the first one I have reviewed that indicates it has any real nutrimental value when it states that it has 2% of daily value of vitamin A, 4% of vitamin C, and 2% of calcium. Stay away from this dressing if your diet required you to be careful of the sodium levels because it has 330 mg which is 14 % of the daily value.

The label calls this product a marinade as well as a dressing and I cannot attest to this but I frequently use Italian dressings as part of my home-made marinades. This appears to be thicker than some other Italian dressing and in my book this is a good trait and makes this a good choice for a light Italian dressing.

Taste Rating = 5
Overall Rating = 4
Style Category = Italian
Fat Category = low fat
Calorie Category = medium calorie
Nutritional Category = low
Sodium Category = med high

In my book this is the “gold standard” by which all other salad dressings are judged. This has been my favorite dressing since the first time I tasted it around 2 years ago. I have eaten it, on the average, of three times a week since then and I’m still not tired of it. I, for one, am amazed by this. I can’t imagine eating anything else that frequently and not being ready to gag if I had to eat it again.

The smell is not very strong upon sniffing the open bottle. It is slightly reminiscent of Dijon mustard although that is not one of the ingredients in it but it does list “Creole mustard” as one. The taste, however, is very strong for a “light” dressing. The first taste every time causes me to pucker just a little bit because of the tartness of it. The taste does not get weaker but stays just a strong throughout the salad but you kind of get used to this tartness. This dressing is fairly thick and has small bits of something dark in it that I can’t identify by reading the ingredients on the label. It looks something like small brown seeds. It could be mustard seeds but the label states that it only contains “ground mustard seed”.

The statistics on the label compares it to regular honey mustard dressing. It states that it has “60% Less Fat and 45% Fewer Calories than Regular Honey Mustard Dressing”. It is not extremely low-fat (4 grams vs. 11 grams) and not extremely low calorie (70 calories vs. 126 calories) or sugar-free (5 grams). The list of ingredients does not contain many surprises; water, Creole mustard (ground mustard seed, distilled vinegar, salt), cider vinegar, sugar, vegetable oil (soybean oil and/or canola oil), maltodextrin, hone, contains 2% or less of : salt, buttermilk solids (milk), spice, xanthan gum, lemon juice concentrate, dried onion, dried garlic. It also has an expiration date on the bottle and I guess this helps to insure freshness but I wouldn’t think it would spoil or get weaker while sealed in the bottle.

As I stated earlier – this is my favorite dressing and until I find a lower-calorie offering with as much taste I’m going to stick with this. As a bonus their web site tell us that “Newman’s Own, Inc. makes no gift to charity, but Paul Newman, who receives all the profits and royalties from Newman’s Own, Inc., distributes all of that personally to the charities of his choice. Since the inception of the company, it is our understanding that the total amount of those gifts to charity has been approximately $200 million.”

Rating = 9

Style Category = Honey Mustard

Fat Category = fat free

Calorie Category = low calorie

Nutritional Category = none

Sodium Category = high

Zero calories, zero fat, zero sugar…. Sounds like a dream come true, doesn’t it? How bad could it be? With no bad stuff in it I thought it would be possible to just drink it like water and pour as much on your salad as you liked. Anyone conscious of their weight or health would have to pay attention to this dressing. With much anticipation I tried this Honey Dijon Vinaigrette from Walden Farms.

I smelled the open bottle first. The smell was reminiscent of eggs and mayonnaise (notice I said “reminiscent” since neither is contained in this dressing). My first taste was from sticking my finger in the bottle and putting it to my lips. Not too bad I thought; very weak but not offensive. I tried it on a tossed salad and when I got through eating I thought – what was the use of that? This is pretty much the conclusion I came to – why bother? The dressing is creamy, but it is watery and thin. You get finished eating it and can’t remember what you were eating. There is almost no taste at all. There is no after-taste and that is good but that’s about the best you can say about it. I keep going back to try it again by tasting the dressing alone and get the same impression- there is a hint (just a hint) of Dijon mustard but that is all. It is so weak the taste is overwhelmed by a bland lettuce like iceberg. It keeps your salad from being dry but that is about all.

The list of ingredients should clue you in to the taste of this dressing: “Purified Triple Filtered Water” is the main ingredient followed by apple cider vinegar, white vinegar, Dijon mustard, cellulose gel, onion, garlic, beta carotene, xanthan gum, propylene glycol alginate, sodium benzoate, food color and sucralose. Not too much to object to here. Don’t expect to get many vitamins or minerals from the dressing either because there are none supplied in this product. Their Web site is not informative; it is mainly a shopping site where you can order salad dressing and other of their products. It took me a few clicks to actually find any information about the dressings other than a couple of videos from a television show in Houston. When I clicked on “More Information” I was just taken to another page that produced the same PR rhetoric that is displayed on the bottle and no new data.

I used this dressing on my salads for several lunches. I applaud Walden Farms for producing dressings that contain no calories, fat, or sugars and I don’t want to be too hard on them. They sell several other dressings and I can only hope that their taste is bolder than this one. I am anxious to try the different flavors but for now I’m not in any hurry to use the Honey Dijon Vinaigrette again.

Taste Rating = 3 bottles

Overall Rating = 3 bottles

Style Category = Honey Mustard

Fat Category = fat free

Calorie Category = no calorie

Nutritional Category = none

Sodium Category = med

The advertising slogan for this dressing is “has the taste of regular dressing!” and for once I think I’d agree. This dressing has the smell of mayonnaise with a hint of something else, possibly eggs and garlic. It is very thick and pours slowly. Don’t expect it to drip down to the lower part of your salad because it is too thick for this – you must mix it up yourself to get the salad to the bottom. I see this as a good trait of this dressing. The flavor is pleasant with no strong after-taste and is strong enough to make a difference in your salad enjoyment.

Like other so-called “light” dressing this is compared to Kraft’s regular offering and states that it has “50% less fat and 33% fewer calories than regular dressing.” This may be true but it still has 4.5 g of fat and 70 calories per serving. I have trouble with the serving size which always (I think) 2 tblsp. I don’t think I could ever just use 2 tablespoons of dressing. It always takes more than that but this is used by all dressings that I have seen. This dressing is one of the first I’ve reviewed that contains cholesterol (10 mg/3%). I guess this is due to the egg yolks in the dressing. The list of ingredients shows no surprises. It consists of water, corn syrup, soybean oil, vinegar, egg yolks, modified food starch, salt sugar and contains less than 2% of garlic juice, monosodium glutamate, phosphoric acid, xanthan gum, potassium sorbate and calcium disodium edta as preservatives, artificial color, polysorbate 60, spice ( I wonder what kind?), dried parsley, lemon juice concentrate, lactic acid (I thought that built up in your muscles during exercise?), natural flavor contains milk. This is another dressing that contains a high amount of sodium (370 mg or 15%). The label indicates that there is no nutritional value in this dressing but it does contain fats and sugars.

This dressing is a good offering in the Ranch type of dressing and if the calories, fat, and sodium content are agreeable to you then you should try this dressing. It is better than most that I have tried - especially better than the “light ranch” offerings in restaurants where the dressing just appears to be a thin, watered down version of their regular ranch dressing.

Taste Rating = 6
Overall Rating = 5
Style Category = Ranch
Fat Category = low fat
Calorie Category = medium calorie
Nutritional Category = none
Sodium Category = med high