A Better-For-You Salad
It’s May, and this month, we’re talking about building a better salad with higher-quality ingredients at your on-site café. The nutritional value of your meal offerings is important for residents, employees, students, patients, and guests. if foodservice providers do not make their offerings from scratch, even basic ingredients such as salad dressings, toppings, proteins, and sliced veggies may become hosts for excessive sugars, packaging, fillers, and artificial substances. This results in less nutrition for our bodies, and in turn, makes us feel sluggish, unsatisfied, and hungry again shortly after eating. When it comes to offering tossed-to-order salad concepts or salad bars, the starting block ingredients of those salads should always be high quality, scratch-made, house-roasted, local, and organic when possible. This means toppings like grains, legumes, proteins, and dressings are prepared by our Chefs instead of coming from a bag or bottle. Preparing these items in-house is more affordable, efficient, and flavorful than pre-packaged items; the freshness of each ingredient remains in-tact during the preparation process, and many ingredients prepped for salads are also used within other dining options throughout each day.
Choosing to eat a healthy salad is a terrific starting step for many employees, healthcare providers, and senior living residents. We honor these healthy decisions by providing high-quality ingredients and the five simple suggestions listed below for a healthier salad experience.
Steps to Build a Better Salad
- Choose your base: lettuce, kale, watercress, cabbage, or other as desired.
- Add flavor and color with other veggies or fruit, such as tomatoes, carrots, cucumbers, strawberries, apples, or dried fruit.
- Include a source of protein, such as beans, baked tofu, or meat.
- Add extras like nuts, seeds, croutons, and avocados
- Choose a simple dressing made of nuts, seeds, spices, oil, and vinegar
Tips & Info for May
Leafy greens, like lettuce and spinach, are what come to mind when we think of salads, but the base of a salad can consist of a variety of vegetables such as kale, watercress, cabbage, shredded Brussels sprouts and even fruit or roasted vegetables. Note that spinach and chard contain a high oxalate content, which can prevent calcium from being absorbed, so they shouldn’t be your only choice of salad base.
Leafy greens are low in calories and many people consider it a free food. With roughly 7 calories per cup, choosing lettuce and other leafy greens provides a power pack of nutrition and fiber. The darker the green of your choice, the more nutrients it contains. For example, spinach and kale are more nutritious than iceberg lettuce.
