You don’t always have to make your own salad dressing—the bottles can be handy, especially if you like trying new flavors. But there are times when a personal touch can really transform a ready-made dressing. Namely, the sticky kind. You know the one: too thick to pour, so you have to use a knife to fish it out. Well, there’s an easy and tasty way to customize the consistency of your too-thick salad dressing, and it’s not by adding water.

Water, not surprisingly, waters down salad dressing. It dilutes the flavor and ruins the texture. The dressing turns into something I can only describe as “gray” (both in color and taste), and drips off all the salad ingredients. Instead, choose a liquid ingredient that will add flavor to your dressing. To do that, we need to consider what salad dressings are made of in the first place.

This is where making your own dressing really comes in handy: It gives you insight into the key players: acid, oil, and emulsifiers. (Read here for the only guide you’ll ever need to making your own vinaigrette.) Whether your salad dressing is an oily vinaigrette or a creamy dressing, they all use these three components. The acid might be lemon or orange juice, or apple cider vinegar. The oil might be olive, canola, or walnut oil. The emulsifier might be mustard, tahini, egg yolks, or a ready-made emulsion like mayonnaise.

To thin out your sticky salad dressing, all you need to do is select the acid or oil you want to loosen it up. This will thin out the consistency while still staying true to the original flavor profile of the dressing. If you’re not sure where to start, check the ingredients list on your bottle of salad dressing. The first two or three ingredients will definitely give you the main acid or oil in their recipe. For my bottle of Trader Joe’s Goddess Dressing, which I find to be a little too thick for my taste, the first two ingredients are canola oil and apple cider vinegar. I have my choice: I can add a little more tang with vinegar, or keep it mild with canola oil. I usually opt for the vinegar, but if you only have the oil available, that’s a perfect choice.