One of the biggest things I had to learn about cutting sugar and counting calories is that more calories with better quality ingredients - whole food, no preservatives, etc - can actually be better than less calories and countless chemicals. For example, do you know what is in your salad dressing? 

I took few minutes today to look at some of the more popular brands of dressings and compare them to my favorite brand, Bolt House Dressings. Ken's Dressings, Hidden Valley Dressings and Wishbone dressings all had similar line-ups ranch (original, lite, fat free), Italian, honey mustard, vinaigrettes and so on. All of them had selections for calories between 15 and 170 calories. Most of them had 1-3 sugar grams except for the vinaigrettes which had about 5g. But then I looked at the ingredients...YIKES! Many of them had several types of sugar: high fructose corn syrup, maltodextrin, carmel, -ose, -tol. That doesn't count the other preservatives and food coloring. (Would you recognize all 100 names for sugar? Here is a great article to help!)

My preference is Bolt House dressings because they stay away from preservatives, artificial flavors, etc. and they still offer low fat, vegan and gluten free options. You can usually find them in the refrigerated produce section of the grocery store. 

My second favorite is making my own dressing and I know exactly what is in it. It's quick and easy and I can mix enough for 2 or 3 days at a time. 

Here is the basic recipe for 1 serving: 

2 Tablespoons of Extra Light Olive Oil
1 Tablespoon of French's Dijon (with Chardonnay)
3/4 Tablespoon of Local raw honey

You can also add Lemon juice or Essential Oil or Organic Apple Cider Vinegar (with the mother) for extra zest and added cleansing benefits. For extra flavor you can add Ginger or Wild Orange Essential Oils, too! It is a bit more in calories (212), but it is much lower in Sodium than the packaged options. It is full of healthy fats and all 6 grams is natural sugar (that helps with allergies, too.) 

Here is one last tip when it comes to salads - lay off the dried fruit. I love adding dried cranberries to any salad, but they are very high in sugar. In a very small handful, it could be almost 15g of sugar!