Salad in a Jar
The order, the reason for it, and how long one actually keeps
Download the printable version (PDF)One page. Made for the inside of a cupboard door.
The one rule
The dressing and the greens stay apart until you’re ready to eat. Everything below is a consequence of that.
Salt and acid soften a leaf given a few hours — not a few minutes, which is why dressing a salad at the table is perfectly fine. A jar sits for hours, so it is built to hold the two at opposite ends with everything else stacked in between.
The order, bottom to top
- 1Dressing — all of it, in the bottom. Two or three tablespoons.
- 2Hard vegetables — cucumber, carrot, peppers, celery, radish, cabbage, red onion. They sit in the dressing happily and form the wall liquid can’t climb.
- 3Beans or grains — chickpeas, black beans, lentils, brown rice, quinoa. They take on a little dressing and are better for it. This layer is what makes it a meal.
- 4Soft things — tomato, olives, anything fragile.
- 5Nuts and seeds — walnuts, pumpkin, sunflower, hemp. They stay dry up here.
- 6Greens, packed to the top — spinach, romaine, arugula, chopped kale. They never touch the dressing.
Tip it into a bowl and it dresses itself on the way out. Or shake the closed jar and eat from the glass. Use wide-mouth jars — quart for a meal, pint for a side.
Five worth knowing
- MediterraneanLemon and olive oil, cucumber, chickpeas, olives, romaine.
- HarvestBalsamic, roasted sweet potato, black beans, pecans, kale.
- Green and simpleTahini and lemon, celery, cucumber, hemp hearts, spinach.
- GardenBlended tomato and herbs, peppers, white beans, sunflower seeds, arugula.
- Whatever’s in the boxThe point is that you don’t need a recipe. Pick one from each layer.
Two ways it goes wrong
Greens in too early, or a jar that isn’t full
Either the greens went in before there was enough underneath them to keep the dressing at the bottom, or the jar wasn’t packed to the top and the salad slid around in transit until the leaves ended up sitting in it. Build it in order. Fill it to the top.
And dry the greens. Water left on leaves after washing shortens how long they last, and it’s the one cause that has nothing to do with the dressing.
How long it keeps
Three days is comfortable. Five is the outside edge. Cut tomato and melon are good for about three days; cut avocado is a same-day proposition — add those the morning you eat it.
Keep the jars on a shelf toward the back, not in the door. Traveling, a well-packed cooler with plenty of ice holds the same three days.
“And God said, Behold, I have given you every herb bearing seed, which is upon the face of all the earth, and every tree, in the which is the fruit of a tree yielding seed; to you it shall be for meat.”
Genesis 1:29
The provision is there. Most of what we do is arrange our week so that we actually eat it.
Blessings,
Paul & Ann
Read next
The Salad Box
The jar travels. This is the version that stays home — a salad bar in your own refrigerator, and most of the week’s prep done in an hour.
Read the articleIf you’re wondering what to put in it
The Yes List — 25 foods worth adding
Twenty-five foods worth getting onto your plate, and what each one is doing there. One page, made for the refrigerator door.
