Sunday, February 3, 2008

Dad's Healthy Salad Dressing


Who wants to take a big bite of healthy salad and bite into a ton of oil and grease? Well, if you enjoy ranch, 1000 island or most vinegar based dressings that is basically what you are doing. But who wants to buy light or fat free dressing that tastes disgusting? NOT ME! But I love salad. So what's a girl to do? My dad came up with the best salad dressing I have ever tasted PLUS it has almost no oil. Can it be true? It can! Keep reading girls. The secret to loving salad again is right here. Oh, and this will make enough dressing for a gigantic bowl of salad to feed all of your family and friends. Or store in a container in fridge until you need more. Just bring to room temperature before serving.

3 TB Balsamic Vinegar
3 TB Honey or Splenda
2 TB Olive Oil
2 TB Wheat Germ (that's right, I said wheat germ, get over it. This is the secret)
Sprinkle of garlic powder
Sprinkle of salt
Couple of grinds of black pepper

Mix Vinegar, Honey, Oil and Wheat Germ in a mug (I use a small teacup) and then place in microwave for 15 seconds. Stir again. Season it up and dress whatever salad you want with it. My dad sometimes will add some yellow or dijon mustard, real sugar or play around with lighter vinegars. Important - when it comes out of the microwave...taste it! Play around with the sweetness or vinegar so you have it to your liking.

Here's why it works (for those science types out there): The wheat germ soaks up the oil. Heating it up makes the wheat germ absorb the oil even better. This creates a yummy texture that will actually cling to the items in the salad. We use oil to bind the dressing onto the lettuce or the tomato or whatever. Instead, you have this thicker consistency that actually sticks to the salad. This does 2 things. First, you need way less oil. Second, you need way less dressing. Third, you won't have a bunch of dressing at the bottom of your salad bowl. Oh, that's 3 things. I guess you got a bonus. But honestly, this works and you'll love the dressing. Don't forget salt and pepper. People never season their greens enough. Tonight, my mom put in spring lettuce mix, avocado, a ripe anjou pear, tomato, whole black olives, roasted sliced almonds and cucumber. It was great!

No comments: