If you want to get the most health value from your salad veggies with the least amount of added fat, reach for an olive oil or canola oil based-salad dressing. Both provide heart-healthy monounsaturated fats and a nifty new study found that monounsaturated fat-based salad dressings achieved the greatest absorption of healthy carotenoids for the least amount of fat. Carotenoids are a fat-soluble family of plant compounds that play a vital role in cardiovascular health and cancer protection. Carotenoids require the presence of fat to be transported from the lining of the gastrointestinal tract into the bloodstream. (This is why you should always consume a bit of healthy fat with all of your veggies!) Click here for 5 of my favorite “monounsaturated” salad dressings.  (Molecular Nutrition in Food Research 2012; 56 (6))