If you order your salads dry or with fat-free dressing, you could be missing out on a lot of nutritional benefits! Research from Purdue University shows that topping your salad with full-fat dressing can help maximize your body’s absorption of health-boosting carotenoids and powerful antioxidants that can help protect against cancers, heart disease, and improve your immune system. Why not get all the health benefits and make it taste a whole lot better, too!?
Maybe you don’t mind the fat-free dressings, and think you’re saving yourself 50 calories or so by choosing fat-free over full-fat. Sure, you’ll save a few calories, but at what expense? Fat-free and low-fat dressings are usually loaded with sugar and other artificial ingredients to replace the flavor lost with fat.
Skip the fat-free dressings made with artificial ingredients, dressings with more than 5 grams of sugar per serving, as well as cheap soybean oil-based dressings. According to researchers, monounsaturated fat-rich dressings promoted the equivalent carotenoid absorption at 3 grams of fat as it did 20 grams of other fats. Look for dressings made with olive, grapeseed (canola), or walnut oils as a base, for less fat but maximum absorption.
