Simple raw garlic salad dressing

This recipe is similar to a Lebanese family recipe that my grandparents have made for years. Its my FAVORITE!!!

The main spice they use is Za'ater, which I think goes perfectly with this salad dressing. I personally love to add a pinch or two of really hot chile powder (like habanero)!

I just wanted to let you know it is very dangerous to combine raw garlic with oil. There is a risk for botulism.

I'm not sure if my story belongs on this comment thread, but here goes. You can move it if needed :)

To make a really long story super short, I have gone from your average American fast food eating, pill popping young adult to basically a hippie eating plants and seeing an acupuncturist and chiropractor. I am also a type 1 diabetic.

To make it a bit longer, In the past 6 months, through nutrition alone, I have gone from 5 pills a day to two, and cut out an injection of basically poison I was doing every two weeks. My insulin needs have gone down drastically as well.

Growing up I was an extremely picky eater. I ate bagels and cream cheese, fries, nuggets, burgers, pizza, etc etc. I didn't like anything green, and the only fruits and veggies I ate were apples and carrots, occasionally. Good ol' American youth diet, right? In high school I drank 4-6 sodas a day for a good amount of time, slurpees, Red Bull, you name it. I cut down on the caffeine for awhile, and then in college went back to it. I work in a very stressful, high paced, crazy schedule environment, and I thought the only way to get through was fast food and Red Bull. I was always tired, felt terrible, zero energy, and so on. I knew it was bad for me, but I didn't realize how detrimental it was, and it was fast and easy. I have always liked cooking, but didn't necessarily cook the healthiest foods.

About 5 years ago I was diagnosed with type 1 diabetes. It had nothing to do with my eating habits, my type is an autoimmune disorder.

I was very active through this whole journey, raced mountain bikes, hiked, rock climbing, etc. So I was in pretty good shape, and then I tore the labrum in my hip. The labral tear was secondary to another hidden condition, and I had a pretty serious hip surgery that laid me out for quite some time. I stopped exercising and sat on the couch proverbially eating cheetos for 6 months. I got a bit back into physical activity, and promptly had to have shoulder surgery because I tore the labrum in my shoulder. Back to the couch. Then my wife left.

A little over a year ago, I started dating my current girlfriend, and shortly after we decided we needed to get in shape. We did P90X, Insanity, and started P90X2. We were following their high protien, low carb diet, and I felt OK, but I was still hungry all the time and still insatiable. I blamed the diabetes, and then 6 months ago watched "Fat, Sick, and Nearly Dead". I realized that all of my problems may be stemming from malnourished cells, as I was eating "healthy", but was not getting nearly enough greens.

I did a three day juice fast, and that changed my life. I felt great, had energy, lost weight, wasn't hungry all the time, and cut down on my insulin needs. I started reading, watching documentaries, and learning. I started incorporating juice into my high protein, low carb diet. I did a few more juice fasts, cut down on animal products, and started eating more whole grains. Then I read "The China Study" a few months ago. I started transitioning to a plant based, whole grain diet, and then started learning more about raw. The last week in December, I went vegetarian and started uncooking more raw foods. I have more energy, many of my medical problems have either lessened or gone away completely, and I'm going full steam ahead with a plant based, partly raw diet. The most amazing thing, that made me a total believer, is I stopped taking insulin for 5 days. 5 days without insulin is unheard of for a type one diabetic, and none of my western doctors understand it. My acupuncturist and chiropractor are all about it though. I'm having a hard time getting rid of butter and Parmesan cheese, but besides that I don't really eat any animal foods.

I am traveling for work next week, and when I get home, I'm doing a 7 day raw food challenge. I want to see how it affects my health for the better!

I understand if this is too long of a post for comments on a salad dressing, and if you want to hear more of my story and fill in many of the holes I just glossed over, please email or facebook me, I'd love to talk to you further! You've been a big inspiration to me ;)

Well, I love pears, so maybe you're the weird one! :)

And up until about 18 months ago, I only ate fries and chicken nuggets. Up until 6 months ago there were very few veggies, and now I'm trying to go almost all plant based and mostly raw. So maybe the vinegar love will come as my taste buds evolve....

Posted from The Rawtarian App

This is pretty freaking delicious! I hate most salad dressing (usually eat salad dry), mostly because I can't stand vinegar, but I made this tonight for tomorrow's lunch, and it passed the taste test! I expect it to be awesome on my salad tomorrow!

It should last pretty long in the fridge as well, don't you think? Nothing in it can really go bad...

Posted from The Rawtarian App

^^I'm doing a cleanse too. I am a 15 year old girl, and I LOVE my salads. I am semi-vegan (I eat fish, but no other animal products) and I was all worried about what would work with my salad, I can eat this for my food every day of the cleanse, it fits PERFECTLY in there, and tastes AMAZINGGGGG!!!

Absolutely delish!!! I'm doing a cleanse and this recipe fit in perfectly ...and now this is my new FAVORITE dressing ever!!! Mahalo!!!

Hey i've been transtioning into a raw vegan for a couple of weeks now and i always loved my salads before but once turning raw vegan i was like oh NOOO what am i going to do for dressing so i thank you heaps for your site! xx

Just starting going raw the other day. I whipped up this dressing last night using thyme, basil, and rosemary. I just had my salad and it was so delicious! Thanks for the recipe

This dressing is my new best friend! I used Parsley, Rosemary, Thyme, and ground Tumeric for my seasonings and I also included the zest from the lemon. Yum Yum Yum!
This dressing is nice and bright and tosses very evenly on a salad so a little could go a very long way.