diff --git a/lib/Newsletter/Renderer/Renderer.php b/lib/Newsletter/Renderer/Renderer.php
index 707bf4bb69..9a40dcc914 100644
--- a/lib/Newsletter/Renderer/Renderer.php
+++ b/lib/Newsletter/Renderer/Renderer.php
@@ -11,7 +11,6 @@ if (!defined('ABSPATH')) exit;
 class Renderer {
   public $blocks_renderer;
   public $columns_renderer;
-  public $DOM_parser;
   public $CSS_inliner;
   public $newsletter;
   public $preview;
@@ -26,7 +25,6 @@ class Renderer {
     $this->preview = $preview;
     $this->blocks_renderer = new Blocks\Renderer($this->newsletter);
     $this->columns_renderer = new Columns\Renderer();
-    $this->DOM_parser = new pQuery();
     $this->CSS_inliner = new \MailPoet\Util\CSS();
     $this->template = file_get_contents(dirname(__FILE__) . '/' . self::NEWSLETTER_TEMPLATE);
     $this->premium_activated = License::getLicense();
@@ -62,8 +60,8 @@ class Renderer {
       $newsletter['preheader'],
       $rendered_body
     ));
-    $template = $this->inlineCSSStyles($template);
-    $template = $this->postProcessTemplate($template);
+    $template_dom = $this->inlineCSSStyles($template);
+    $template = $this->postProcessTemplate($template_dom);
 
     $rendered_newsletter = array(
       'html' => $template,
@@ -150,8 +148,7 @@ class Renderer {
     return @\Html2Text\Html2Text::convert($template);
   }
 
-  private function postProcessTemplate($template) {
-    $DOM = $this->DOM_parser->parseStr($template);
+  private function postProcessTemplate($DOM) {
     // replace spaces in image tag URLs
     foreach ($DOM->query('img') as $image) {
       $image->src = str_replace(' ', '%20', $image->src);
diff --git a/lib/Util/CSS.php b/lib/Util/CSS.php
index 0eba64c00c..7acda297aa 100644
--- a/lib/Util/CSS.php
+++ b/lib/Util/CSS.php
@@ -35,7 +35,6 @@ class CSS {
   */
   function inlineCSS($url, $contents=null) {
     $html = \pQuery::parseStr($contents);
-
     if (!is_object($html)) {
       return false;
     }
@@ -124,7 +123,7 @@ class CSS {
     }
 
     // Let simple_html_dom give us back our HTML with inline CSS!
-    return (string)$html;
+    return $html;
   }
 
   function parseCSS($text) {
diff --git a/tests/unit/Util/CSSTest.php b/tests/unit/Util/CSSTest.php
index f4ec883b73..b08801535d 100644
--- a/tests/unit/Util/CSSTest.php
+++ b/tests/unit/Util/CSSTest.php
@@ -41,7 +41,7 @@ class CSSTest extends \MailPoetUnitTest {
     $styles = 'p { color: red; }';
     $content = '<p>Foo</p>';
     $html = $this->buildHtml($styles, $content);
-    $result_html = $this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
+    $result_html = (string)$this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
     $this->assertContains('<p style="color:red">', $result_html);
   }
 
@@ -49,7 +49,7 @@ class CSSTest extends \MailPoetUnitTest {
     $styles = 'p { color: red; } .blue { color: blue; }';
     $content = '<p class="blue">Foo</p>';
     $html = $this->buildHtml($styles, $content);
-    $result_html = $this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
+    $result_html = (string)$this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
     $this->assertContains('<p class="blue" style="color:blue">', $result_html);
   }
 
@@ -57,7 +57,7 @@ class CSSTest extends \MailPoetUnitTest {
     $styles = 'p { color: red; }';
     $content = '<p style="color:green">Foo</p>';
     $html = $this->buildHtml($styles, $content);
-    $result_html = $this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
+    $result_html = (string)$this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
     $this->assertContains('<p style="color:green">', $result_html);
   }
 
@@ -65,7 +65,7 @@ class CSSTest extends \MailPoetUnitTest {
     $styles = 'p { color: red !important; }';
     $content = '<p style="color:green !important">Foo</p>';
     $html = $this->buildHtml($styles, $content);
-    $result_html = $this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
+    $result_html = (string)$this->css->inlineCSS(null, $html);
     $this->assertContains('<p style="color:red">', $result_html);
   }