Why Your Salad Greens Brown Quickly And How To Prevent It

It can be frustrating to feel like you've wasted food before you've even had the chance to enjoy it. It's even more annoying when you're planning on using a particular item for a meal, only to find that it's rotten and mushy. This is unfortunately the case for many a bag of lettuce or leafy greens that have met an untimely end. It feels as if just minutes after opening that bag of spring mix or romaine lettuce, the leaves are brown and soggy before they even reach the Caesar salad. It happens because vegetables (and some fruits) can wilt or discolor due to natural ethylene gas.

Ethylene occurs in all fruits and vegetables, but some produce creates more, while other items are more sensitive to it. The gas causes cell walls in the vegetable to break down, softening as it begins to ripen. An excess of the gas will cause the vegetable to rot and give off that distinctly icky smell. Trapped in a plastic bag with nowhere to go, the ethylene gas builds up until the greens inside are an entirely different shade. 

While there's no way to halt the production of ethylene gas fully, there are ways to manage it without sacrificing your produce. These include organizing your fridge to prevent waste, and using your crisper drawer correctly, as well as keeping ethylene-high foods away from those that react badly to it. But it's also worth trying a specific technique that can "fluff" your lettuce into freshness.

A highly effective method to prevent bags or tubs of pre-washed salad leaves from browning involves "fluffing" them. As you unpack your haul from the grocery store, open the package right away, then simply move the pieces around to mix everything up. In doing so, you're not only allowing yourself to spot and remove any already-browned pieces that would speed up the decaying process, but you're also releasing the buildup of ethylene gas.

Gas isn't the only reason that your greens are potentially browning, though it is a big contender. The debate over whether you should tear, snip, or chop your summer greens has raged for generations, with some insisting that tearing better minimizes browning than the others. Wet leaves might be another reason you notice the butter lettuce is turning brown, so be sure to pat those leaves dry to prevent wilting. 

Some variations of lettuce can go bad very quickly when left at room temperature. To ensure that this doesn't happen, toss that produce back into the crisper drawer of the refrigerator immediately after use. You could add a paper towel to the packaging to absorb any moisture. And try going for hardier salad leaves like radicchio rather than dainty ones, such as arugula, as they're more likely to last longer. With these tips, you can stop lettuce from being one of the groceries you're most likely to waste, and instead start trying some great salad recipes.