27 list, you’ll find which options are the healthiest. The Healthiest Store-Bought Salad Dressings Gallery On the other, you’ll find the unhealthiest options.
By Krista Johnson Nutritionist
ther asserts that "light" and "fat free" Choosing salad over a sandwich or burger dressings are often the most common always makes for a healthier lunch, right? places to find high fructose corn syrup Thanks to hefty portion sizes, extravagant which she deems a "diet no-no." toppings, and certain brand name salad Further, low-fat salad dressings prevent dressings that pack up to 200 calories and the body's ability to absorb the carote20 grams of fat per serving, this may not noid antioxidants in salad greens and toalways be the case. We tracked down matoes, thus greatly diminishing a major nutrition information for the leading store health benefit of eating salad. A Purdue -bought brands of ranch, thousand island, University study found that certain Caesar, and Italian/ vinaigrette salad healthy fats -- like those in olive oil -dressings, and ranked them each, leading were necessary to absorb the up to the one that has the most fat and full benefits of the other vegetables in the calories. salad. Further, most people tend to ignore their salad dressing's reported serving size, which is usually only two tablespoons. If the only way you can enjoy a salad is by drenching it in a cup of dressing, then you may not be getting the healthiest lunch you can. While you should remain wary of storebrand salad dressings with high fat and calorie contents, nutritionists remind salad-lovers not to shy away from fat altogether, and warn that low-calorie or lowfat dressings may not always be a healthier option than their full-fat counterparts.
There are so many salad dressings to choose from. Sure, you know what kind you want on your salad. Some days you’re in the mood for a creamy Caesar. Other days you want herbed vinaigrette. But even once you’ve narrowed it down to the type of dressing you’re craving, there are so many brands and types that it can get tough to choose.
Not all brands make their dressings the same — some brands’ products are healthier than others. And when you’re cooking yourself up a nutritious and crisp salad, you don’t want to pour something Nutritionist Keri Glassman cautions that without any nutritional value over the top. Not when you have an equally deliwhat "light" dressings save on calories and fat they often more than make up for cious option that could be better for you! in sodium and sugar. We also ranked It takes some serious poring over numthese same varieties of dressings accord- bers and labels to get to the bottom of ing to which ones had the least fat and which ones are really the healthiest. We calories. While these may appear to be did all that label-roving for you and narhealthy alternatives, the sodium level is rowed it down for each of the 11 most worth paying attention to. Glassman fur- popular types of salad dressing. On one
Since there are so many brands out there, ranging from generic to specialty, we selected the most popularly sold storebought salad dressing brands. These included Annie’s, Ken’s, Kraft, Newman’s Own, Wish-Bone, Hidden Valley, Bolthouse Farms, and Marie’s. From there, we checked the nutrition labels for each type of dressing to find the healthiest and unhealthiest version of each. To judge the healthfulness of each dressing, we checked the calorie count, fat content, sodium content, and added sugar. Find out which brands sell the healthiest salad dressings and which sell the unhealthiest salad dressings for all your favorite flavors. Balsamic Vinaigrette Ken’s Balsamic Vinaigrette This Balsamic Vinaigrette isn’t going to derail your diet — it’s 100 calories per serving with 3 grams of sugar. Not too much of a difference from the other dressings we found, but of the most popular brands, this was the most caloric and contained the most sodium. Blue Cheese: Marie’s Super Blue Cheese Anything called “Super Blue Cheese” is going to be a little extra. But this dressing is a lot extra. In a 2tablespoon serving, there are 160 calories, 17 grams of fat, and 220 milligrams of sodium.
