Canning Salad

That's right folks, canning salad.

I found this idea on Pinterest and was instantly intrigued. Would it really work? Would it taste good? Would the vegetables get gross? Wouldn't the salad dressing touching stuff for a week compromise the veggie goodness. Well, let me tell you...it was AWESOME!!!

I used about a tablespoon or so of salad dressing on the bottom. I used carrots on the bottom as I figured they were the least likely to get trashed by the dressing. And then I just smashed in as much vegetables as I possibly could.

Actually, I was a little more methodical than that.

I placed my 6 pint sized jars on the counter. I got out my cutting board and cut everything in the order that I wanted it to go into the jars. So, first I dumped in the dressing. Then, I cut the carrots and put them in the jars and then cut the cucumbers and dumped and then the celery...you get where this is headed. I even hardboiled some eggs while I was chopping and added them in. Last but not least I washed and dried and dried and dried my lettuce and jammed in as much as I possibly could into the jar before shutting the lid. I had actually almost filled my jar with veggies before I even got to the lettuce part so there was some serious smashing.

This next step is most important...DO NOT WATERBATH OR PRESSURE CAN YOUR JARS!!! hahahahaha...I'm just imagining someone really thinking that these are "canned" salads.

While I was cutting up vegetables I had some leftover that I decided to just chop up and put in containers for snacks and lunches for the kids. I figured while I was chopping, might as well do it all...

Doesn't it look pretty...:)

Ok...so here's my confession. This is my second time around making these salads and I haven't eaten my second batch yet...But the first batch worked great. Vegetables stayed crisp as if I chopped it that day. I ate them all throughout the week and ate my last one maybe 5 or 6 days after originally putting them in jars.

This time around I experimented with avocado. I cut up one avocado and put it in one of the canning jars just to see if it would turn. I didn't want to pick out brown smushy avocado out of 6 salads. I haven't eaten it yet but they have been in my fridge for over 24 hours and the avocado looks exactly the same as when I put it in the jar. I say, SUCCESS!!!!