Why Salads Are Not Usually Healthy and How To Do Them Right

Written by Sarah Cain Thursday, 10 December 2009 05:15

Deceptive Healthy Foods

People who try to become healthier often make mistakes as a result of what they have been told to eat by the media.  The most notorious example is how soy was paraded as a marvelous health food, and it is only now that the truth about soy is being revealed.  Soy is virtually always genetically engineered, and it is particularly damaging to the thyroid, and thereby causes hormonal imbalances.  The dangers of soy could fill up multiple articles.

Why A Salad Is Often The Most Unhealthy Choice

When heading into a restaurant, many believe that the salad bar is a healthy and nutritious option.  They are very wrong.  The core ingredient of most salads is lettuce, a vegetable which has very little nutritional benefit.  Lettuce is on par with corn nutritionally, and we are talking about real corn; not the genetically engineered variants that are lining grocer shelves.  Practically all of the restaurant lettuce is 'conventionally' (chemically) grown, meaning that this normally nutritionally deficient vegetable has only 1/10th the nutrients that it did eighty years ago, and it was hardly nutritious back then.  The truth is, eating a lettuce salad will usually leave you hungry, and it will do very little to improve your health.  If you are actually satisfied from eating salads, then it is probably because of the hazardous, empty calorie additives that top them.  In comparison to these industry-perverted toppings, lettuce seems like a nutritious super food.

The biggest problem with salads is the dressings.  Salad dressings usually contain monosodium glutamate (M.S.G.), often in a hidden forms, and various artificial sweeteners.  You can count on this being true for any restaurant dressing.  In fact, we challenge you to find a commercial salad dressing which does not contain soybean oil as its main ingredient.  We have not been able to find one yet.  Many salad dressings deceptively market their use of olive oil, but the ingredients still reveal that soybean oil is the main ingredient, and the trace amounts of olive oil are included only for dishonest marketing.

The other toppings are horrific too.  The so-called "bacon" is literally manufactured with toxic chemicals in flavor factories, and the main ingredient is bleached table salt.  We're not even going to get started on the croutons or where the 'eggs' come from.  You probably don't want to know.  The so-called "black olives" are only black because they are stored in iron oxide that is produced by melting industrial iron in sulfuric acid.  In reality, the black olives have decomposed so much in storage that their true color is a pukish blend of gray and green.  Yummy!  So, when faced with a meal in a typical restaurant, be advised that a greasy cheese burger is usually a healthier choice than the salad bar.  It really is.

Are you still wondering why after working so hard to take care of yourself that your case of diabetes or high blood pressure nevertheless keeps getting worse?  Perhaps this article will make it a little more clear.

If you are looking for a truly healthy salad, you will have to make your own dressing, in the least.  We make some of our own, but our collection is far from complete.  Please send us your own all natural salad dressing recipes, and we will feature them on the site.

Italian Dressing

• 1 cup cold pressed extra virgin olive oil
• 3/4 cup Apple Cider Vinegar
• 2 Tablespoons Parsley
• 6 Tablespoons Lemon Juice
• 2 Tablespoons Garlic
• 2 Tablespoons Maple Syrup
• 2 Tablespoons Honey
• 1 Tablespoon chopped Red Bell Pepper
• 1/2 Tablespoon Onion Powder
• 1/2 Teaspoon Sea Salt
• 1/2 Teaspoon Paprika
• 1 Teaspoon Basil
• 1 pinch Oregano
• 3/4 cup Flour
• 1 cup Water
• Unbleached Whole Wheat Flour

The flour is both a thickening agent and an emulsifier, so the amount will vary.  The original recipe included soy lecithin, but soy products should be avoided.  Simply blend these ingredients together in a blender, and add more water until you reach the desired consistency.

The natural sugars of this recipe should make this dressing much safer for diabetics than most dressings, but we are unable to make particular promises about its effects, because every individual is different.  To be extra careful, we recommend using only raw and unprocessed maple syrup and honey, and as always, buy only organic if possible.

For homemade salads, it is best to add something other than lettuce.  Spinach has very little flavor whilst raw, so it accompanies a salad well.  It unfairly has a bad reputation, because it develops a strong taste and smell whenever it is cooked.  Raw spinach should be not be a problem for anyone.  A wide variety of different vegetables are recommended, but the super foods are spinach, broccoli, and celery.  Bear in mind that organic vegetables will yield about 10 times more nutrition than chemically grown produce.  So, if you are not eating organic, then you would need to eat 10 salads to make up for your loss.

 

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