How to Make the Best Salad Dressings for Weight Loss

To lose belly fat you need to avoid low-fat or fat-free salad dressings. Yes, it sounds like the opposite, but low fat and fat free salad dressings from the store are filled with more chemicals than they are worth, and are generally high in sugar or non-sugar (non food) sweeteners.

These are my absolute favorite salad dressings and they are in my opinion the best salad dressing for weight loss for multiple reasons. All of these recipes are meant to be blended together with a hand held blender or a food processor. In a pinch however, just chop all your ingredients very small and mix vigorously with a fork.

Beauty & Health Note: Always invest in high quality oils to use in your dressings and cooking. This one tip will do more for your overall health than any out there.

Oil Shopping Tips

1. Buy oil in dark glass bottles.

2. Primarily make salad dressings out of extra virgin & cold pressed olive oil. Olive oil is high in mono-unsaturated fat (one of the good healthy fats!), Good fats, like monounsaturated fatty acids (MUFAs) in olive oil, can actually help to reduce belly fat. A 2002 study (1) on high protein, high mono-unsaturated fat diet, found that women on this diet lost significantly more total and abdominal fat compared with those who were on the lower protein, lower mono-unsaturated fat diets.

3. Also use organic hemp oil, & borage oil (but never cook with these oils). Hemp and borage oil have a type of compound called gamma linolenic acid (GLA) which has been shown to help with preventing weight gain in several studies.

Other ingredients

1. Choose sea salt from either ancient seabeds (like the Himalayan sea salt, or the Utah 'Real' sea salt), which are more nutritious than regular table salt. If you suffer from a thyroid disorder where you are a low in iodide, just keep in mind that these healthier sea salts are lower in iodide, and so you should think about add some kelp to your flavoring, or a small amount of table salt for iodide as well.

2. Lemon juice - will help to stimulate your liver and digestive organs, which is a vital aspect of proper weight maintenance.

3. Plain organic yogurt - this is a great salad dressing thickener, and is filled with helpful probiotics which are showing more and more to be a helpful part of weight loss.

Grandmother's Olive Oil Shopping Tips

1. Cold pressed. This means that no heat was applied during processing of the olive to make oil.

2. Always dark glass bottles. This will help to ensure that the oil does not go rancid from light and heat exposure. At all costs avoid plastic containers, since the chemicals in plastics can seep into the oils over time.

3. Expect to pay. The good qualities oils are not cheap. It takes time and money to make a good quality oil. If the oil is cheap on the shelf, then it may be a red flag that it is not entirely being honest about what is in the package.

4. Look for a harvest date that is in the past year. A high quality producer who cares about their product will usually put this information on their bottle.

5. Look to see what region (not just the country). A high quality producer who cares about their product will usually put this information on their bottle.

6.Look to see if the type of olive plants (cultivar) is listed. A high quality producer who cares about their product will usually put this information on their bottle.

(1) Diabetes Care. 2002 Mar;25(3):425-30. Effect of a high-protein, high-monounsaturated fat weight loss diet on glycemic control and lipid levels in type 2 diabetes. Parker B1, Noakes M, Luscombe N, Clifton P.