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Kraft Italian Dressing is a classic dressing that has been around for years. It is a creamy dressing with a zesty flavor that is perfect for salads and pasta dishes. But, is Kraft Italian Dressing vegan?
Kraft Zesty Italian Salad Dressing is vegan because it does not contain any ingredients sourced from animals.
Below is a table showing Kraft Italian dressing flavors and its vegan status.
| Flavor | Vegan Status |
| Kraft Zesty Italian Salad Dressing | Vegan. |
| Kraft Zesty Italian Lite Salad Dressing | Vegan. |
| Kraft Zesty Italian Fat Free Salad Dressing | Dietary vegan. |
| Kraft Tuscan House Italian Salad Dressing | No, contains Milk. |
| Kraft Creamy Italian Salad Dressing | Maybe, contains Natural Flavors. |
| Kraft Deluxe Supreme Italian Dressing | No, contains Milk. |
| Kraft Creamy Italian Salad Dressing with Olive Oil | No, contains Egg Yolk. |
| Kraft, Roasted Red Pepper Italian Dressing | No, contains Milk. |
Kraft Italian Dressing Ingredients
Below is a list of ingredients from all the flavors that I could find.
- Balsamic Vinegar
- Canola Oil
- Cheese Culture
- Citric Acid
- Dried Garlic
- Dried Onions
- Dried Red Bell Peppers
- Enzymes
- Garlic
- Grape Juice
- Modified Food Starch
- Natural Flavor
- Oleoresin Paprika
- Onions
- Parmesan Cheese
- Polysorbate 60
- Potassium Sorbate And Calcium Disodium Edta (To Protect Flavor)
- Propylene Glycol Alginate
- Red Bell Peppers
- Romano Cheese Made From Cow’s Milk
- Salt
- Soybean Oil
- Spices
- Sugar
- Vinegar
- Water
- Whey
- Xanthan Gum
- Yellow 5
- Yellow 6
[Source]
As always I’ve highlighted the ingredients that we need to take a closer look at.
Non-Vegan Ingredients
Milk
Some ingredients are made from milk such as cheese and whey. Since it’s made from cow’s milk, they are not vegan.
Questionable Ingredients
Sugar
Sugar can be a tricky ingredient and there is an instance when sugar could be classified as not vegan-friendly. The most common sugar types are beet sugar and cane sugar, the latter being more popular in candy and sweets. So the chance of the sugar being cane sugar in dressings is pretty low.
Beet sugar is always 100% vegan, but the cane sugar might now be. It’s often refined to make it easier to use in candy and in this process it’s also bleached. This is where it can become a problem for vegans because a common way to bleach sugar is to bone char from dead cows.
Exploiting animals in the production of an product is not okay with vegans, so in the sense the sugar could be classified as non-vegan.
Natural Flavor
This ingredient in an umbrella term, meaning that it can contain several different ingredient to create the flavor for the product and there is no way of knowing if the ingredients are vegan-friendly. If natural flavors contains ingredients derived from animals it is never disclosed on the ingredients label, however milk is often disclosed.
This makes it very hard for vegans to know if natural flavors is vegan and the best way to probably to contact the company and ask. So be careful when it comes to natural flavors.
Artificial Colors
The last questionable ingredient is artificial colors and this is a highly controversial ingredient within the vegan community. It’s know for being tested on animals and many vegans tends to stay away for that reason, there are however vegans that still eat product with artificial colors. So I usually separate vegans to them ethical vegans and dietary vegans.
So while dietary vegans might eat artificial colors, ethical vegans would not. Now there are other research methods out there such as computer simulations that can do a great job, but it seems like animal testing is still being done.
Conclusion
Two flavors of Kraft Italian Dressing being vegan and one flavor suited for dietary vegans is great. I do enjoy making my own delicious salad dressings, but it’s nice to know that I can buy dressing when I’m lazy.
It’s getting easier and easier for vegans to find good products, but sometimes it’s hard to know if an older product is vegan-friendly. That’s why I’m making these articles to help more vegans find more good products.
Thanks for reading, take care!
