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Produce => Edible Plants => Topic started by: GrannieAnnie on May 22, 2008, 11:29:13

Title: A lively salad
Post by: GrannieAnnie on May 22, 2008, 11:29:13
I'm so embarrassed. Last night I took a salad to a party prepared with our loose leaf frilly lettuce, each leaf  carefully washed under running water and shaken off, and a slug/snail crawled across a friend's plate who was eating her salad right beside me, its little antennae sticking up proudly. She laughed it off, had been raised on a farm, but I was mortified. I don't know how it survived the washing >:(   Any suggestions? besides not taking my salad out in public ever again?
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: Barnowl on May 22, 2008, 11:34:30
Add some salt to the water you wash the salad in?
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: Rhubarb Thrasher on May 22, 2008, 12:08:07
it shows you're not using pesticides  :D
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: OllieC on May 22, 2008, 12:10:22
I soak mine for an hour or so - the slugs genrally walk up to the top... I'd rather eat the odd slug than a bit of metaldehyde. Actually, that's not true, terrible really.
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: big J on May 22, 2008, 12:13:03
just tell her she got the organic salad with free range slugs  :-X
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: Barnowl on May 22, 2008, 12:14:15
Forgotten to mention rinse off with unsalted water - got to watch those arteries (well I  have to).
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: GrannieAnnie on May 22, 2008, 12:25:50
Quote from: big J on May 22, 2008, 12:13:03
just tell her she got the organic salad with free range slugs  :-X
hahahahaha!  I'll tell her that!  And the salt soaking sounds like a good idea and never crossed my mind. Thank you! :D
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: Crystalmoon on May 22, 2008, 12:57:17
I use a plastic salad spinner, cheap contraption from Wilkinson, seems to fling nasties to the sides & off the salad leaves  ;D
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: Suzanne on May 22, 2008, 15:43:04
In our house, if salad doesn't come with wildlife its authenticity is challenged.  ;D
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: antipodes on May 22, 2008, 16:45:11
in France people sometimes wash lettuce in water with vinegar added, they say it kills beasties like aphids?
I have found a slug in my salad before though, you just pick them out  ;D
Title: Re: A lively salad
Post by: Mrs Ava on May 22, 2008, 18:29:32
My father in law scoffed chard once and I saw the little slug go into his mouth in it and he didn't notice.  EEK!  Mark had a shield bug in his lottie lettuce so now I shred or seperate the leaves and fling them in the washing up bowl filled with cold water and leave them for a bit first, as said before, most of the creepies will crawl or float to the surface.  I think the worse I ever did was served some purple sprouting broc which was infested with white fly....as people started eating and I poured the water away, I wondered what all of the grime was in the cooking water....then I realised!!!!!  Oh the joy of being chemical free.