Having a delicious dressing in the fridge makes eating healthy veggies easy, which will help you stick to your cancer prevention or other healthy eating plan!

Not to brag, but I often get compliments on my salad dressings! 🙂 I use it on all veggies, not just raw, cold salads. Eating cold raw foods is not ideal in some situations, according to Chinese medicine. For example, in the cold winter months, it’s generally better to eat warmer foods. For those with weak digestion or who are undergoing exhausting treatments such as chemotherapy and radiation, lightly steaming our vegetables helps our weak stomach get started on the process of digestion. In the Chinese medicine view, raw vegetables may have a lot of nutrients, but if we can’t absorb them properly (nausea and vomiting, reflux, diarrhea, etc.), we aren’t benefitting anyway. Better to be gentle with our digestion, as it’s the source of all the strength and energy in our body.

Simply steam, water-saute, bake, or press-and-roll leafy greens (or other vegetables!). Drizzle with your dressing and eat!  By drizzling an uncooked dressing, you avoid heating any oils, which is better for your Liver (in Chinese medicine), digestion, skin, and of course better for preventing heart disease and cancer.

I don’t usually follow a recipe. Here’s a template you can adapt to whatever ingredients you have or feel like:

1. Put some oil in a small jar. I usually use extra virgin olive oil as the base, but any good quality unheated/ unrefined, unsaturated oil is good (for more info on oils, read “Fats that Heal, Fats that Kill” by Udo Erasmus). I might add a bit of flax or hemp oil for the Omega benefits. If I’m going for sesame kind of taste, I might add a bit of roasted sesame oil.
2. Add something acidic: I like to squeeze fresh lemon or lime juice, or use raw, unpasteurized apple cider vinegar which has many health benefits. Sometimes I use a bit of balsamic as well, for the taste. I put about the same amount of acid as oil, but you can vary this according to taste.
3. Add a tiny bit of sweetener: A very small amount of raw honey, maple syrup, green stevia or any sweetener helped round out the taste of the dressing
4. Add salt, pepper, and garlic: To taste, but be generous. Remember the flavour can be very strong because it’ll be drizzled over, and diluted by, the many vegetables you’ll be eating with the dressing! Garlic can be raw (crushed and finely minced), which has many health (and taste) benefits, or dried.
5. Add tasty bits (optional): For example, a squirt of dijon mustard, a chopped sundried tomato, dried or fresh dill weed, yogurt (start with less oil), minced fresh raw garlic, a bit of pesto, and/or diced avocado (start with a bit less oil).
6. Shake jar and enjoy! Depending on the ingredients you can probably keep it in the fridge for a week (if you have something like yogourt) or much longer if it’s just dried herbs, oil and vinegar.

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