How to Make Healthy Salad Dressing

Want dressing that’s actually healthy? Here are two tricks for healthy salad dressing: a creamy pesto and a raspberry vinaigrette — and both taste AMAZING.

This post was created in partnership with DeLallo. All opinions are our own.

When Alex and I first started cooking together, salad dressings were first on our “better homemade” list. Have you ever made homemade ranch dressing? The flavor is incredible, like a version of it that’s 100 times more real. We’ve built up an arsenal of healthy homemade salad dressing that we use for everything from pizza nights to dinner parties. Now today, we were presented with a challenge from DeLallo: can you come up with a few healthy salad dressing recipes? We’ve come up with a few salad dressings that have lower calories than the rest, but taste just as amazing. Want to know the secrets to healthy salad dressing? Keep reading.

What is healthy salad dressing?

First of all: what’s our definition of healthy salad dressing? To us, homemade salad dressing is healthy salad dressing. Making dressing at home uses high quality ingredients and no preservatives. Instead of loading on the fats, salt, and sugar, you can use just enough to get the right flavor. And you won’t be using any of the additives that makes things shelf-stable for years and years in the refrigerator. So that’s healthy, part 1!

For today’s challenge, we’ve added a second definition of healthy: less calories than the typical salad dressing. Most store-bought dressings recipes have about 70-80 calories per tablespoon. So for our healthy salad dressing challenge, our goal was less than 50 calories per tablespoon.

How do you make healthy salad dressing?

With this in mind, we were presented with a challenge from our favorite Italian specialty foods company: DeLallo! (You may remember we visited their HQ in Pittsburg last fall.) DeLallo sent us a huge box of their high-quality olive oils, vinegars, pestos, and spices, and asked us to create a few healthy salad dressing recipes. Want to know what we created?

Concept 1: Creamy Pesto Dressing

It seems like a creamy salad dressing would be less healthy than a vinaigrette dressing, right? At least, it did to us! Surprisingly, we’ve flipped this on its head with our formula for a healthy creamy dressing! We’ve based this dressing concept on our healthy ranch dressing, which has only 37 calories per tablespoon (vs about 100 calories in a standard vinaigrette). Our secret? This dressing uses plain yogurt to cut back calories versus the standard creamy dressing. There still a bit of mayonnaise for richness and flavor, but much less than a typical creamy dressing.

For the flavor in this pesto salad dressing, we’ve used this squeeze pesto from DeLallo! It’s so easy to use and the squeeze bottle makes it perfect for using for other uses: sandwiches, grilling veggies, etc. Adding it to this dressing adds just the right garlick-y savoriness to the salad dressing. It’s like a ranch dressing – but more like pesto ranch! With all the flavor going on in this dressing, it weighs in at a surprisingly low 48 calories per tablespoon.

How to make healthy creamy pesto salad dressing:

In a medium bowl, stir together the following ingredients (makes 3/4 cup):

• 1/2 cup plain whole milk yogurt
• 1/4 cup tablespoons mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons prepared pesto*
• 1 teaspoon red wine vinegar
• 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt

Store refrigerated for up to 1 week.

*For the pesto, we used the DeLallo Squeeze Pesto; you can also use the DeLallo Simply Pesto Sauce. Or for another fun variation, we tried the DeLallo Hot & Spicy Pepper Pesto, which was also delicious!

For the vinegar, we used DeLallo Chianti Red Wine Vinegar.

Concept 2: Raspberry Vinaigrette

The next healthy salad dressing experiment went in the other direction: instead of creamy, we went with fruity! Adding fruit to a salad dressing is another way to make it healthy: blending in fruit makes the dressing creamy without adding more oil. So you can get away with less oil and more flavor. This time, we based the concept on our strawberry salad dressing but with a new spin: as a raspberry vinaigrette!

For this raspberry salad dressing, we used both fresh raspberries and a extra-virgin olive oil from DeLallo and their Raspberry Balsamic Vinegar. You also could use a standard balsamic vinegar, red wine vinegar, or apple cider vinegar for the vinegar here. As with any salad dressing, the quality of ingredients, like olive oil and vinegar, is key to good flavor. With a little maple syrup added for sweetness, this raspberry vinaigrette turns out tangy, bright, sweet and oh so good on a salad! Using our fruit trick, this one still weighs in at only 43 calories per tablespoon.

How to make healthy raspberry vinaigrette dressing:

In a small blender or with an immersion blender, blend the following ingredients, then strain it through a fine mesh strainer (makes 3/4 cup):

• 1 cup fresh raspberries
• 1 1/2 tablespoons maple syrup
• 1 tablespoon raspberry balsamic vinegar, balsamic vinegar, or red wine vinegar*
• 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil

Store refrigerated for up to 1 week.

*For the vinegar, we used DeLallo Raspberry Balsamic Vinegar. For the olive oil, we used DeLallo Extra Virgin Olive Oil.

And that’s it, how to make healthy salad dressing!

Thanks to DeLallo for this healthy salad dressing challenge! We learned to much and can’t wait to develop more ideas. Make sure to look for DeLallo products in your local grocery store: or you can order their products online

What do you think of these healthy salad dressing concepts? Will you try them and report back in the comments below?

Healthy Salad Dressing

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(1 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

5 from 1 reviews

• Author: Sonja Overhiser
• Prep Time: 5 minutes
• Cook Time: 0 minutes
• Total Time: 5 minutes
• Yield: 3/4 cup 1x

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Description

Here’s a trick for healthy salad dressing: using plain yogurt helps to reduce calories, and pesto brings in big flavor! This creamy pesto salad dressing is like a healthy ranch and perfect on crispy romaine or for dipping veggies.

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Ingredients

• 1/2 cup plain whole milk yogurt
• 1/4 cup tablespoons mayonnaise
• 2 tablespoons prepared pesto (or homemade Basil Pesto or Cashew Pesto)
• 1 teaspoon red wine vinegar
• 1/8 teaspoon kosher salt

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Instructions

1. Stir together all ingredients in a bowl. Serve immediately or refrigerate until serving.
2. Store refrigerated for up to 1 week.

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• Category: Salad Dressing
• Method: Stirred
• Cuisine: Italian

Keywords: Healthy Salad Dressing, How to Make Healthy Salad Dressing

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