Make Your Salad Good For You

I am surprised at what a bad attitude people have towards salads. ‘Dieting’ is an invariable part of every social conversation and it’s not long before someone brings up either salads or exercise. At least one person in the group will cringe at the very mention of these words. Seriously, take any demographic and try it. People seem to think that a salad will mean torn up lettuce or worse cabbage, tossed with cubed tomatoes and topped finally with the ultimate food from hell, bean sprouts. Everyone knows the hazards of salad dressings and that’s the sole reason the salad has gained such unpopularity.



Whether bottled or homemade, salad dressings can be very misleading. They are laden with calories and without them a salad is nothing but cut up veggies waiting to be cooked. Reports suggest that even dressings that are labelled 99% fat free have other harmful additives like salt, sodium, MSG and even trans fats. Homemade dressings always seem to involve mayonnaise or at least the mandatory dash of oil making the salad as good as a burger. The key lies in balance. Ultimately a salad should be crunchy, moist and wholesome enough to substitute an adult meal. Few changes in the preparation and ingredients can make a salad the perfect diet food. That’s the good news!



Always start with cold, fresh, well washed vegetables. Prepare a salad just before mealtime unless the recipe suggests otherwise. Healthy meat options for a salad are boiled or roasted chicken, turkey ham, tuna fish (try to buy a can preserved in brine instead of oil), steamed fish, prawns or crab meat. Seafood is high in cholesterol but if consumed in moderation it adds a lot of essential fatty acids and oils to a diet. Boiled egg as a topping is nutritious and makes the meal more satisfactory. The ideal vegetables are all the lettuce varieties. A tightly wound iceberg lettuce has a distinct crunchiness compared to romaine lettuce or even the outer leaves of the iceberg lettuce. Once you have your leafy base, add your colours. Tomatoes are a must; bell peppers add the zing and sweet corn kernels balance the flavours. The vegetable combinations for salads is endless, a good resource for ultimate salad recipes is allrecipes.com.



Now to the dressings, there are two basic types. The oil and vinegar mix with fresh or dry herbs (vinaigrettes) and the creamy mayonnaise based Caesar and Waldorf like dressings. The key to wholesome satisfaction is substitution. It’s sad when you have to substitute but it’s better than not having a dish altogether. Hang a cup of fresh yoghurt in a clean cotton napkin for a couple of hours. What you get next is cream cheese, provided the yoghurt was low fat, the cream cheese will be too. Use part cream cheese with any bottled of fresh dressing and cut back on the calories. To alter the tastes further add a dash of an Italian herb mix or better still, Tabasco. Finally make a meal out of your salad with add on’s like whole wheat pasta or croutons of oven toasted garlic bread.



Other creative additions can be grilled mushrooms, slivered carrots, bean sprouts (if you are a fan), artichokes, zucchini, boiled kidney beans, broccoli, olives, cottage cheese, tofu and even raw papaya. Few must keeps for regular salad fun are bottles of balsamic vinegar, white or red wine vinegar (red is more robust like the wine, the white one is tangy and dry) and extra virgin olive oil. Keep a regular supply of yoghurt to make your own cream cheese and experiment with adding different flavours like pastes of cucumber, capsicum, green chilli or garlic to make your own signature dressings. View the images in the gallery below to see if your salad turns out like I said it would!

View Healthy Salads Stock Photos by PhotosIndia.com