Bagged lettuce is a lot less healthy than you’d think!
Nice and easy, bagged lettuce from the supermarket. It saves you time cutting and washing and the portions are exactly right. And it’s still healthy! Or is it?
Salmonella
Research from the University of Leicester has shown that bagged lettuce is much less healthy than we previously thought. The juice from the broken leaves turns the lettuce into a breeding ground for salmonella! The salmonella grows about 24,000 times as fast because of these juices that come out of the broken leaves. The researchers came to this conclusion after studying bagged spinach, baby green oak, and other types of salads.
Bacteria
Apart from this worrying revelation, the researchers also found out these circumstances also make salmonella bacteria even stronger. So, this increases the chance of infection even more! This is why you should always immediately eat bagged lettuce, and definitely not put the open bag back into the fridge. Consume it as quickly as possible, otherwise the natural bacteria that grow on lettuce grow faster as well. Rinsing the lettuce doesn’t help: the salmonella attaches so strongly that the bacteria will end up back in the bag anyway.
Yikes, we’ll just buy a head of lettuce from now on! But, how to keep it fresh? That’s what you’ll read on page two.
Gas
First, let’s explain why lettuce wilts so quickly. When lettuce is packaged in a plastic baggy, the manufacturer ads gasses to keep the lettuce fresh and crunchy. As long as the lettuce is unopened, it will stay quite fresh and it won’t wilt as quickly. Once you open the bag, these gasses escape, leaving the lettuce open to bacteria and airflow that will make the lettuce brown and soggy.
Paper towels
To keep lettuce from wilting, all you need are some paper towels. Simply stick a paper towel in your bag of lettuce to prevent it from going brown. The paper towel will absorb liquid from the lettuce, keeping it fresh up to five days longer. Replace the paper towel daily to prevent it from becoming too moist. This way you won’t just keep the lettuce fresh longer, it also prevents salmonella from spreading.
