Balance of Food

The old adage of the salad dressing being one part vinegar to three parts oil with a few herbs and spices feels as ancient as black-and-white TV. A sweetener and salt are rather prominent on salad dressing labels these days. And in "light" dressings, water is the primary ingredient. After all, water dilutes the fat content, making it "light." Forgetting the obsession of putting sugar in everything for a moment, it's not really clear why a salad dressing, a product to put on vegetables, needs to have a sweetener. But if you are going to have a sweetener, it should be sugar, not high-fructose corn syrup. I'm not normally crazy about "light" dressings, but for pasta salads, it works really well. Here is the label of the "light" dressing I have bought for awhile. Five basic ingredients in this order: water, vinegar, sugar, soybean oil, and salt. Could do without the sugar and salt, but overall, not too bad. Unfortunately, the manufacturer (which I'm not identifying here) changed the recipe for the dressing. Here is the updated label: Five basic ingredients in this order: water, high-fructose corn syrup, distilled vinegar, vegetable oil (canola and/or soybean), and salt. To start off, the sweetener is now the most prominent ingredient behind water. Think about this: it's dressing and vinegar and oil can only get as high as 3rd on the list. The new formula also has a higher sodium count (490 mg vs. 400 mg) and more sugars in the total carbs (4g vs. 3g). A change for taste? No. Health? Not at all. Cost? Probably. Political pressures drive down the cost of high-fructose corn syrup, and instead of raising the prices, it's "easier" to reduce the quality of the product. Now that I see the changes, I am done buying this product. Increased sales? Not in this household. I won't buy salad dressing with high-fructose corn syrup, and won't buy a dressing that puts the sweetener ahead of vinegar. And that includes the new spray bottle dressings. A nice idea in theory, except that you do need some fat with the salad. The most prominent one is Wish-Bone (yes, I'm calling them out) that features high-fructose corn syrup. And again, the order is water, then high-fructose corn syrup. Ken's has a line of spray bottles that do feature sugar, which helps. But if you truly need a spray bottle, buy an empty one, put in a flavored vinegar, and go to town. Mix in some oil, but play around with the traditional 3-1 ratio. Salad dressings are supposed to enhance the flavors of the salad, not drown them in sugar and salt, or even worse, high-fructose corn syrup. Dress your salads, don't overdress them.