Salads are a summer staple because they are light, healthy, and delicious. Nowadays, salads are made from a variety of different types of greens, vegetables, and fruits. Sometimes they are mixed with nuts, sunflower seeds, croutons and other toppings like cheese or eggs. When used for a full-course meal, they are often topped with a selection of meats like ham, chicken, shrimp and more.
However, a salad isn’t a salad if you don’t have the right dressing to top it off. Luckily today, there is a wide variety of dressing flavors to choose from matched only by the number of brands now available on the market. But who makes the best salad dressing? That is definitely the question.
My family eats a lot of salads all year long. However, we all have different tastes in dressing. Some of us like the standards while others of us like something a bit out of the ordinary. Consequently, we have tried a lot of different ones over the years.
I decided to do a little survey to determine what the favorite salad dressings might be and which brand is popular with the most people. Using my family as a base and adding another group of friends, I came up with a cross-section of people. Here are the results.
Almost everyone likes the standards French, Italian, thousand island, and ranch. One-third of the people surveyed chose ranch as their favorite dressing. However, the dressing blend (e.g., buttermilk ranch versus cucumber ranch, etc.) and brand varied from person to person. Still, the majority preferred standard ranch dressing to any blend.
A surprising number of people I interviewed like some of the more unusual dressings like Asian Sesame Ginger, Sun Dried Tomato, and Raspberry Vinaigrette.
The choice of dressing brand was much less decisive. Kraft dressing barely won out over Wish-Bone. Oddly enough, a large number of people actually preferred some of the newer brands like Ken’s Steakhouse and Newman’s Own.
Using the four top brands listed by people I interviewed, I made a list of each brand’s dressing choices and asked people to rate them on a scale from one to five with five being the highest rating. Those dressings that no one had tried yet are marked “UNK” for unknown. Here are the results in preferential order:
Kraft Salad Dressing is one of the best-known salad dressing brands, as well as one of the least expensive overall. They make some of the best dressings on the market, which range in price from about $1.99 to $3.99, depending upon the size of the bottle and the type of dressing:
Asian Toasted Sesame (3 stars)
Balsamic Vinaigrette and Organic Balsamic Vinaigrette (2 stars)
Blue Cheese Fat Free (2 stars)
Blue Cheese Ranch (3 stars)
Buttermilk Ranch (3 stars)
Caesar Italian (3 stars)
Caesar Italian Oregano (UNK)
Catalina, (4 stars)
Creamy Italian & Seven Seas Creamy Italian (3 stars)
Creamy Poppyseed (3 stars)
Cucumber Ranch (3 stars)
French and French Light (3 stars)
Golden Caesar and Golden Caesar Light Done Right (3 stars)
Greek Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Italian and Fat Free Italian (4 stars)
Peppercorn Ranch (2 stars)
Ranch and Ranch Light Done Right (4 stars)
Ranch With Bacon (1 star)
Raspberry Vinaigrette Light Done Right and Organic Raspberry Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Red Wine Vinaigrette & Seven Seas Red Wine Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Roka Blue Cheese (3 stars)
Roasted Red Pepper Italian with Parmesan (5 stars)
Seven Seas Green Goddess (3 stars)
Seven Seas 1/3 Less Fat Red Wine Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Seven Seas Viva Italian & 1/3 Less Fat Viva Italian (3 stars)
Sour Cream & Onion (4 stars)
Sun Dried Tomato (5 stars)
Tangy Tomato Bacon (3 stars)
Thousand Island and Thousand Island Light Done Right (4 and 2 stars respectively)
Three Cheese Italian (3 stars)
Three Cheese Ranch (2 stars)
Zesty Italian, Zesty Fat Free Italian, and Organic Zesty Italian (4 stars)
Wish-Bone Salad Dressing also have a very loyal following. They are also reasonably priced ranging between $1.99 and $3.99, depending upon the size of the bottle and the type of dressing:
Balsamic Italian Vinaigrette (2 stars)
Balsamic Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Berry Vinaigrette (UNK)
Blue Cheese with Gorgonzola (3 stars)
Caesar with Aged Romano (2 stars)
Cheese Italian (3 stars)
Chunky Blue Cheese (2 stars)
Creamy Caesar (4 stars)
Creamy Italian (4 stars)
Creamy Lime Cilantro (UNK)
French (3 stars)
Garlic Ranch (2 stars)
Honey Dijon Vinaigrette (2 stars)
Italian (3 stars)
Lemon Garlic & Herb Vinaigrette (2 stars)
Light Asian Sesame Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Light Balsamic & Basil Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Light Raspberry Walnut Vinaigrette (4 stars)
Olive Oil Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Ranch (3 stars)
Raspberry Hazelnut Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Red Wine Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Robusto Italian (3 stars)
Russian (3 stars)
Spring Onion Ranch (4 stars)
Sweet & Spicy (3 stars)
Thousand Island (3 stars)
Western and Fat Free Western (UNK)
Western with Bacon Flavor (UNK)
Ken’s Steakhouse is relatively new on the market. It actually grew out of the homemade dressings served at a restaurant called “Ken’s Steakhouse.” Price wise, they slightly more expensive than some of their competition, averaging about $2.59 per bottle. However, they make a variety of popular dressings, which include:
Caesar & Lite Caesar (3 stars)
Chunky Blue Cheese & Reduced Calorie Chunky Blue Cheese (3 stars)
Creamy Parmesan & Lite Creamy Parmesan (3 stars)
House Basil & Balsamic Vinaigrette (2 stars)
Italian & Lite Italian (3 stars)
Olive Oil Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Red Wine Vinegar & Olive Oil (3 stars)
Romano Cheese Italian (3 stars)
Ranch (5 stars)
Russian (3 stars)
Thousand Island (3 stars)
Fat Free Raspberry Pecan (4 stars)
Fat Free Sun Dried Tomato Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Light Buttermilk (3 stars)
Light Raspberry Walnut Vinaigrette (4 stars)
Lite Honey Mustard (2 stars)
Lite North Italian with Basil and Romano (2 stars)
Lite Sweet Vidalia Onion (3 stars)
Growing in popularity with each passing year is Newman’s Own Salad Dressing backed by actor Paul Newman. Money from these products is funneled into various charities throughout the world. These products are competitive in nature, ranging from about $2.29 to $3.99, depending upon the size of the bottle and the dressing involved:
Balsamic Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Caesar (3 stars)
Creamy Caesar (3 stars)
Creamy Italian (4 stars)
Family Recipe Italian (4 stars)
Olive Oil & Vinegar (3 stars)
Parmesan & Roasted Garlic (4 stars)
Ranch (3 stars)
Thousand Island (3 stars)
Three Cheese Balsamic Vinaigrette (3 stars)
Although the above brands and flavors barely scratch the surface on the wide number of salad dressings now available on the market, they represent some of the best. There is literally something for everyone’s individual taste as well as for any type of salad that can be conjured up.
Share your favorite dressing choices in the comments section below or, if you try one of the above sometime in the future, let us know what you think and rate it yourself. We’ll share the results.
Go forth and eat!
