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Our Original Dressing is a vinegar & olive oil dressing with a sweet/sour taste. It has been made continuously since the 1930’s, where it was formulated for use in numerous recipes at the Hendrickson’s Cafeteria. Our Classic dressing has 80% less sugar, no oil, and lots of spices and vegetables. It’s taste is similar to a straight vinegar & oil mix.
Hendrickson’s Cafeteria was originally located at Arlington and Easton in downtown St. Louis. It was moved in the 1940′s to Union Avenue near the old GM plant. It closed in 1968, at which time the salad dressing business started. Our Original & Classic dressings can now be found in stores throughout the United States. See our store locator or shop for help in locating our dressings.
All of Hendrickson’s dressings are fat free. Our Original dressing does contain olive oil; however, the current FDA guidelines consider a product fat free if it contains less than .1 grams of fat per serving. Hendrickson’s far exceeds these FDA guidelines, containing only .05 grams of fat per serving. The Classic Italian dressing contains no oil whatsoever.
Hendrickson’s dressings are made with quality ingredients, containing apple cider vinegar, sugar, potassium chloride, sea salt, garlic, and a special blend of spices. Our Classic Italian dressing replaces the trivial amount of olive oil in our Original Sweet dressing with a starch derived from potatoes.
Hendrickson’s dressings have a product life of 12 months, regardless of whether it is opened or unopened. The product expiration date is stamped clearly on the top ‘scuff ring’ of our bottle and is 12 months to the day from when it was manufactured. This date can be safely extended several months by refrigerating our product immediately after purchase, opened and unopened bottles. Note that opened bottles of Hendrickson’s must always be refrigerated.
Starting November, 2018, we started injecting a small amount of inert gas into the top of the bottle to prolong the product life. You may experience excess pressure release when opening the bottle seal.
Noticing a gray/greenish ring at the top of your dressing? Our Original Sweet Vinegar and Olive Oil Dressing does have a tendency for the olive oil to congeal in the neck of the bottle. This is more often seen in the winter months when our homes are cooler, making our refrigerators run colder. But it can happen any time depending on how cold you keep your refrigerator temperatures. Unfortunately when it congeals, it combines with some of the spices, creating that heavy, gray/green film around the neck of the bottle at the surface of the dressing. While this isn’t pretty, it is normal and does not affect the taste or safety of the dressing in any way. Let the bottle come to room temperature to melt the oil, then give it a vigorous shake to redistribute the oil and ingredients into the dressing.
Vaad Hoeir of St. Louis has certified that our product is kosher and pareve.
All Hendrickson’s products are wheat and gluten free.
Hendrickson’s Dressings are available in many grocery stores throughout the mid-west and beyond. We would love to be in every grocery store in America, but, unfortunately, that isn’t up to us 😉 We are available in many national grocery chains, but even that doesn’t mean that within that chain we’ll be in every store. That decision depends on many different factors such as store size and shelf space. If you are in a store searching for our product, our advice is to ask to speak to the grocery manager (rather than a stock clerk) and ask if they carry Hendrickson’s. If you see a chain near you on the store locator page, it’s always best call the store first and speak to the manager before making a special trip. If your store doesn’t carry Hendrickson’s, ask the manager to start doing so.
If your local store has discontinued Hendrickson’s Dressings, speak directly to the grocery manager and ask why they no longer carry it. You can ask the manager if they would order the product in special for you; most store chains are willing to do that these days. The other thing you can ask the manager is the contact information for the store buyer; you can write them and ask them to reconsider their decision to discontinue the product. If all else fails go to our Shop page where you can order the product online by following the links to our Amazon storefront or the WalMart website.
If Hendrickson’s Dressings are not available at a store convenient to you, you can have it shipped directly to your home by using the online Shop tab and following the links to our Amazon storefront or WalMart’s website.
We use PET plastic bottles for our dressings. According to the National Association for PET Container Resources (www.napcor.com), there is no connection between PET plastic and Bis-phenol A (BPA). BPA is not used in the production of PET material, nor is it used as a chemical building block for any of the materials used in the manufacture of PET. BPA is used to make polycarbonate, a different plastic from PET.
For the last several years the FDA has made a concerted effort to reduce the intake of sodium by the American public. We are happy to announce that our Hendrickson’s Original Sweet Vinegar and Olive Oil Dressing now uses a ‘Sea Salt Blend’ that significantly reduces sodium; from 598 mg/serving to 160mg/serving. In addition to sea salt, we now include potassium chloride as a sodium substitute. Currently, it is generally accepted that increasing the intake of potassium is beneficial, noting that individuals on certain medications should review their potassium intake with their doctor. In addition, we’re pleased to say, in side to side comparisons with our original formulation, no one was able to detect a difference in taste.
Look for our label with the red starburst on the right-hand side of the label.