Today’s special guest recipe is brought to you, in its entirety, by future Dietitian Emily Rykaczewski AKA Health By Emily

All About Salad Dressing

Salads are hailed as one of the healthiest meals you can eat. An easy way to increase one’s vegetable consumption and support weight management objectives. However, if made incorrectly, it can be quite the opposite. The salad dressing you select and the amount you use can go a long way in determining whether your healthy lunch or dinner selection ends up being a highly caloric meal. Salad dressing is one of the top sources of calories that doesn’t come from a food group food in the average Canadian diet (shout out to Andy for this interesting factoid). Oils, which may  be used as salad dressing, also fall into that category of being a calorie-rich discretionary food. The liberal use of either may seriously compromise your use of salads to support weight management.

Many of the store bought dressings are high in fat, calories, and sodium but making your dressing at home can give you some control over what you are putting in to your body. Dressing is actually easy to make and can be cheaper than the store bought varieties. Check the recipe below for a “creamy” dressing alternative!

Healthy Homemade Avocado Dressing Recipe

Ingredients:
1 large Avocado

4 scallions

1 TBS Parsley

1 TBS Dill

3 garlic cloves

1 TBS unsweetened soy milk

2 TSP Black Pepper

2 TSP Chili Powder

1/2 TSP Salt

1/2 lemon juice

Splash of water

Instructions:
1. Peel avocado, chop root end off of scallions, and remove parsley and dill from stems.

2. Place avocado, parsley, dill, garlic cloves, soy milk, black pepper, chili powder, salt into blender.

3. Squeeze half a lemon into blender.

4. Blend.

5. Add water until smooth consistency is reached.

There you have it! This dressing is easy to make and contains no unnecessary calories or additives. Remember to only use about 1-2 tablespoons of dressing ,regardless of the variety, to reduce any unnecessary additional calories.

Two tablespoons of this dressing contains 40 calories, and 3 grams of fat, only .5 of which are saturated, while also containing 0 grams of sugar.  This recipe is definitively a win/win.

Check out the final product & nutrition facts below!

Hope you guys enjoyed this awesome recipe, and thanks once again to Emily!

Andy De Santis RD MPH