Some Salad Dressing

This is my favorite! It is inspired by the delicious Asian Drenching, from Sundrenchers. I have a very dear friend who has a gift for cooking healthy and tasty, and I bugged her to figure out a recipe for this delicious dressing. She, being a wonderful and amazing woman, went to work and created this. I will love her forever–especially because it’s a lot cheaper to make it this way than to buy it!

This goes great on fresh spring rolls or in asian style wraps.

Raw Asian Dressing

1/4 cup safflower or grapeseed oil
1/4 cup of agave
2 Tbsp Nama Shoyu, San J Tamari, or High Quality Soy Sauce
2 tsp apple cider vinegar
1 tsp ground ginger
½ tsp garlic powder
½ tsp sesame oil (optional)

Blend on low power in Vita Mix just until blended. Store in a mason jar or salad dressing jar in the fridge.

Here is another one that we all love–Rachel used to make it almost every other day at school:

Creamy Strawberry Dressing (great with a spinach/strawberry/mandarin orange salad) Yield: 2 cups

5 large strawberries
1/8 c balsamic vinegar (less if you don’t like that, or omit altogether)
1/8 c raw honey
1 ¼ c canned coconut milk

Blend until smooth. Chill to thicken.

And, I couldn’t post without a tribute to one of my favorites–this one is also a favorite with my older children:

Honey Poppy Seed Dressing

3/4 cup grapeseed or safflower oil
1/3 cup honey
1/4 cup red wine vinegar
2 tablespoons poppy seeds
1 tablespoon minced onion
1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
1/2 teaspoon salt

Blend on low speed for about 30 seconds. Also, if you don’t like onion so much, you can half the amount of onion.

And, lest you think that I always make my own salad dressing, and thus, get an inaccurate picture of my character, please be advised that our fridge is stocked with many a flavor of Follow Your Heart brand dressings, as well as Brianne’s Poppy Seed dressing.

Also, honestly, I have always felt it is more important to get the kids to eat the salad than what dressing they put on it. Over time, you can decrease the amount of dressing or gradually switch to healthier versions of their favorites (my kids really like the Follow Your Heart Chipotle Lime Ranch, and it is way better than the Hidden Valley Ranch of yesteryear, but they DID start out with Hidden Valley!).