Bagged salad

[lindag]

I had dinner last weeke at one of town's better restaurants.  I was so disappointed in the salad.

the lettuce had clearly come from a bag because it had that unmistakeable chemical taste I recognized.

i should have complained but didn't.  Why would a good restaurant compromise their ingredients this way?

[Shelby]

Laziness?

[ElsieD]

I dunno.  But I have stopped buying bagged pre-sliced/shredded anything.  By that, I mean carrots, broccoli and the like.  Even after it is well rinsed that chemical taste is still there.   Guess that's how it survives for weeks in the fridge.

[JoNorvelleWalker]

I often buy pre-washed organic spring mix.  Indeed, I enjoyed some last night and plan on more tonight.  I understand such things are bleached.  Nonetheless never noticed an unpleasant taste or odor...except after a few weeks when it becomes brown and slimy.

 

On the other hand I found a live wasp in a sealed package once upon a time.

 

[pastrygirl]

Efficiency? - it is pre-cut and pre-washed, saving time and labor

Lack of other options?  Maybe there just aren't many sources for local baby lettuces and they buy what Sysco has to offer.

 

Is there much of a farmers market scene or farm-to-table hoopla where you are?  I haven't been to MT in several years, but it seemed very meat and potatoes at the time.

Edited June 15, 2017 by pastrygirl
company name correction (log)

[JoNorvelleWalker]

2 hours ago, pastrygirl said:

Efficiency? - it is pre-cut and pre-washed, saving time and labor

Lack of other options?  Maybe there just aren't many sources for local baby lettuces and they buy what Sysco has to offer.

 

Is there much of a farmers market scene or farm-to-table hoopla where you are?  I haven't been to MT in several years, but it seemed very meat and potatoes at the time.

 

 

There is a farmers market here but I am usually working while it's being held.  I don't understand the rest of your post.

 

[lindag]

9 hours ago, pastrygirl said:

.

 

Is there much of a farmers market scene or farm-to-table hoopla where you are?  I haven't been to MT in several years, but it seemed very meat and potatoes at the time.

 

It still is.  There are a few farmers' markets around but the growing season is quite short and the options are not much.  The Hutterite farmers come to Stevensville (a few miles South of where I live) and bring their produce, poultry, breads, etc. but the quantities are suitable for huge families (like theirs).  Giant loaves of bread, huge cabbages the size of basketballs, chickens around 7 or 8 pounds.  Too big for my needs.

Very little In the way of delicate items like tomato, lettuces, summer squash, etc.

[pastrygirl]

15 hours ago, JoNorvelleWalker said:

 

 I don't understand the rest of your post.

 

 

Sorry, I didn't mean to be cryptic, I was responding to the question

On 6/14/2017 at 1:22 PM, lindag said:

Why would a good restaurant compromise their ingredients this way?

 

Restaurants are a tough business and controlling labor costs is a constant struggle - as well as finding skilled help to begin with.  So maybe they are lazy and just don't care, or maybe the chef needs to prioritize labor allocation and  dealing with fresh heads of lettuce is one of the corners that gets cut.  If you get fresh romaine by the case it needs to be trimmed, cut, and washed.  If you get bags of romaine hearts or cut leaves with preservatives there is much less work to do and it probably keeps longer. 

 

As for options - I don't know what produce wholesalers there are in western Montana.  If there are no small specialty providers, chefs are stuck with Sysco (not known for being fine-dining quality), Costco, Restaurant Depot.  All more likely to carry convenience products.  With MT being mix of mountains and range land, maybe there are not the small farms and greenhouses that can provide beautiful fresh lettuces.  Maybe it takes an extra day or 2 for produce to get there from CA and quality suffers so much that bagged salad starts to look good. Here in Seattle we have one huge produce wholesaler and many smaller ones, some all organic, some only microgreens, some foragers, there's this guy Merv who drives over from Yakima with summer goodie direct from the farms ...  chefs here have lots of options.  Chefs in Montana may not have as many.

[lindag]

I'm wondering if this was a one-time situation,.  Perhaps they disn't have the best product available on that particular day.  I've dined there before and did not get the bagged salad product.  Let's hope that was the situation.

[HungryChris]

Getting a decent salad in a restaurant is a surprisingly disappointing endeavor. It has long been my belief that any restaurant that could reliably deliver a fresh salad would quickly develop a good reputation, provided there were no other glaring shortcomings. It is why, in my mind, Olive Garden has done as well as it has and why salad bars were invented, but only do well in areas where the restaurant has a steady and reliable stream of customers.

A truly good salad is made to order with ingredients that have been freshly washed, dried and assembled. If the restaurant relies on a minimum wage payed, part time, high schoolers to do the work, you can see the issues at once. If they pay someone what it takes to do the job impeccably, the price of the salad goes up inordinately.

Now add to the problem, a restaurant that is not busy all the time, or is closed one day of the week and the problem is compounded because now, there must be rules about what to do with washed lettuce at the end of the day, the night before the restaurant is closing for a day, and what to do with that lettuce before the restaurant opens after being closed for a day. There is the “would you serve this?” question, that so many people in the kitchen have their own and varied answers to. Consider how much lettuce to buy to ensure supply, but not have excess, but also think about how often can deliveries be made and at what time do they come.

If you are running your own little place where you can ride honcho over everything and know in your heart that every salad that goes out is flawless, do you not want to expand and do better? At some point, you must delegate responsibility, you take a step back, because now you are relying on others to do your bidding and it becomes a judgement call on who to choose to do it for you. Now you have opened the door to why so many restaurants fail and just think, we are still just talking about salad and overlooking the other items on the menu.

That is why a truly good salad, at a restaurant, in my mind is like a window into the soul of the place. If you can get a reliably great salad every time, chances are, they are running a tight ship, at least for now.

HC