Homemade Modification of Salad Dressings to Reduce Their Erosive Potential

To investigate the possibility of reducing the erosive potential of salad dressings by adding yoghurt.

Two hundred enamel samples from bovine teeth were allocated to 20 groups (n = 10). Three modified commercially available balsamic dressings (addition of 10%, 20%, 50% yoghurt or 8.8 mM calcium chloride) and two homemade salad dressings with and without modifications were tested. Enamel samples were eroded for 2 min, rinsed for 30 s with tap water and finally abraded (20 brushing strokes with toothpaste slurry). After 40 of these cycles of erosion/abrasion, the dental hard tissue loss was determined by contact profilometry.

For commercially available salad dressings, modification yielded a statistically significant decrease in enamel wear. The exception was Anna's Best Dressing Balsamico modified with 8.8 mM calcium chloride, for which no reduction was found compared with the unmodified dressing. For all homemade dressings, a significant reduction was observed when modified with 20% yoghurt. However, when only 10% yoghurt was added to the homemade dressings, an increase of the erosive potential was observed compared to the unmodified dressing.

The study shows that increasing the calcium concentration only with calcium chloride in commercially available salad dressings did not show predictable outcomes to reduce erosion. However, mixing 20% plain yoghurt into the dressings reduced the erosive potential statistically significantly.