With the warmer weather, I'm trying to get into good habits with having salads for lunch. I have a nifty container dealy-o to bring them to work, but I'm wondering if you folks have any good ideas for keeping salad a bit fresher for longer, because I typically buy a bagged/boxed salad and it's got nasty spots and slime by day 3 or 4. I'm considering just buying my own heads of lettuce & greens, chopping them, spinning 'em, drying them with a towel, then vacuum sealing them into glass jars (a la Salad in a Jar)... but before I do all that work, I am wondering if there are any tricks or tips you guys use to keep your salad greens stay tasty and yummy during the week.

well im a bit OCD when it comes to packaged veggies and fruit and feel the need to clean them again before eating even if it states its clean. i buy the big bag of lettuce at Costco dump it in my salad spinner rinse with water spin dry and then package into glad 2 cup containers, i get about 4 containers from one bag and if i eat it every day it takes 4 days, sometimes i get lucky and its still good other days i have to pick it over and get some of the bad stuff out. im not sure there is much you can do to keep it fresher other then really looking at the bag B4 you buy it to make sure it looks really fresh. and eat it with in 4 days. i have found with my new "clean" diet i am going to the store over the weekend and sometimes Wed. cause the fruit/ veggies just are not holding up or im learning to only buy what i will eat in 3-4 days and going back for more when im out.
glad to hear you are trying to be better with your lunches!

sometimes it helps if you put salad greens in a ziploc baggie, punch a couple holes on both sides of the bag with a knife, and put with a paper towel in the ziploc with the salad greens to soak up the excess moisture build up.

if you buy the big containers of salad greens at costco, the plastic ones, when you get home, punch/stab a couple of holes in the plastic containers with a knife - it'll give some air to breathe, preventing extra moisture build up.

the above tips sometimes will give me about 5, almost 6 days for salad greeds.

romain hearts will last longer in the fridge, and so will the hierloom lettuce - both from Costco.

hope this helps!

oh i forgot to add the towel at that bottom, i do that to! no hole punching though....

They make Salad Keeper things like http://www.amazon.com/Progressive-International-LKS-06-Lettuce-Keeper/dp/B000OUY2QO, but I'm wondering if it's worth the effort since going to the store mid-week is such a pain in the butt for us (DH bikes, my schedule is tight between getting off work and letting Nikolai out, etc.). It's not impossible, but it's not easy, either.

thats kind of cool looking.

basically the same concept as putting a paper towel and poking holes in a ziploc bag, then putting it in a vegetable drawer. I've found they work OK - maybe it'll keep it a couple of days longer, but then again, i wouldn't want to be eating certain salad greens if they're over a week old anyway. For other veggies - food saver...and I know you have one of those!