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Keeping a mini version of your own salad bar in your fridge is a fun way to eat healthy salads all week. It's perfect for meal prep, and can turn whatever you crave into a well-rounded, healthy meal.
Why you Need a Salad Bar
We all love the IDEA of eating salads. But what most of us don't like is chopping a lot of romaine lettuce and vegetables just to make one salad for a meal. When we want to eat a salad, we just want to eat it, not roll up our sleeves and wash and cut up a lot of vegetables first. Which is probably the main reason why most of us - just don't.
I'm going to show you the easy way- do that prep work just once and then have your own salad bar that you can eat from all week. You can pull together your own custom salad for a quick lunch, or you can grab some pizza for dinner and then pull out your salad bar to make sure you still have somewhat of a healthy meal.
And whatever your main dish is for dinner during the week, most of the time a nice salad bar would be the perfect thing for a side dish to go with it.
In this post, I'll show you:
- What containers to use that are ideal for a self-contained salad bar that will fit in your fridge.
- What foods to put in a salad bar and what foods not to put in a salad bar so that it will stay fresh longer.
- How to prep all the food for your salad bar.
- And how to safely store it so the ingredients will stay fresh for several days or up to an entire week full of delicious salads.
- And since you can't make a salad without some leafy greens for the base, I've got a blog post to show you a great way to keep a large bowl of salad greens fresh for the whole week too.
What Containers to Use
The right containers for your salad bar are really important. You're looking for a container that has divided sections, or a large container filled with smaller individual sections that can lift out.
Why is that important? Because when you want a salad to go with your meal, you don't want to pull out a lot of individual small bowls and set them up just to eat a salad. And I know from experience when it comes time to clean up from dinner, the last thing you want is to gather up a whole bunch of individual containers and lids, and put them all back together again and pile them in your fridge.
I learned a long time ago that having one container that you can pull out and put away is the key to making the whole salad bar idea something that you will return to again and again.
Everyone will have different sizes of space in their fridge and in their kitchen cupboards for storing things. So I'll try to show a wide variety of salad bar containers that could fit different storage size situations.
For example, we have a pretty small fridge. My space is at a premium, and there are only three of us in our household right now. So my small snack box is a great option for us.
When I first came up with the idea of a personal salad bar, we had five people living at home. My salad bar container was a little bigger than it is now so that it could feed five of us for several meals within a week.
Here are some examples of perfect containers that can house your salad bar:
- small snack box (the one that's currently in our fridge)
- large round snack box (good for a slightly larger group)
- salad bar container set (the one I use for salad bar for extended family dinners)
- Large rectangular salad bar set ( good for a party or other large gathering)
Best Salad Bar Containers
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large rectangular salad bar set
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Bonus Tip 👇
Wash your salad bar containers by hand. After making our family salad bars for over a decade now, I have learned that when you use plastic divided containers - it's a good idea to just wash them by hand. I've had bento boxes and other containers that I used for salad bars get just slightly warped in the heat of the dishwasher - just enough that they don't fit back together properly. It's really not that big of a deal to rinse them out with hot water, or wash them in the sink. Better to be safe than sorry!
What to Put in a Salad Bar
Once you have a big bowl of leafy greens safely stored in your fridge, you'll need to stock your at-home salad bar with lots of toppings. When it comes to knowing what to keep in a good salad bar, there are a few basic principles to remember.
- Make sure the vegetables you store in your salad bar are dry. Wet food will wilt and spoil more quickly. If you have freshly shredded carrots, for example, don't immediately store them in your salad bar. I would blot them dry with a paper towel a little bit before adding them to the salad bar. If you follow a general rule of storing dry (or mostly dry) foods in your salad bar, your salad bar will last longer.
- Replace cheese more frequently. We love all kinds of cheese in our salad bar, but it does tend to dry out after 2-3 days. The best way to handle this is to include only the amount of cheese that you would eat in that time period, and then just replace it more often.
- Some wet food is okay in a salad bar. Canned or jarred food like beets, olives, pickles, corn, etc. are fine to keep in a little of their liquid in your salad bar. Just make sure they are totally contained in their own compartment - don't let the liquid leak into any other food next to it.
For a quick reference, I made you a PDF that you can download. You might find it helpful to print it out and keep it on your fridge, or just save the download on your phone so you can take a look at it for reference when you're buying groceries.
What Not to Put in a Salad Bar
If you want your salad bar to stay fresh for the whole week, some toppings are better left out or just added to your salad right before serving it.
- Don't add vegetables that have exposed seeds. Those types of vegetables tend to be very wet once they're cut open and the seeds exposed - like a tomato or a cucumber, for example. You can put cucumber in your salad bar, if you cut the seeds out. I'll show you how to do that in a minute. And tomatoes are fine, if they're whole (uncut) cherry tomatoes, since the seeds (and all that wetness) stays inside the tomato.
- Don't put strong smelling foods in the same container with the other ingredients. An example of this would be beans such as pinto beans, or black beans. Some strong smelling things seem to be OK in a salad bar, like blue cheese (go figure). But beans can spoil more quickly than vegetables, cheese, and other salad bar ingredients. If I put beans in my salad bar, I plan to use them up within two days. Or you could store them in a separate small container with a lid.
- Don't store foods that absorb moisture in the same container as cut fruits and vegetables. An example of this would be sunflower seeds or nuts. If they are stored in the same container with vegetables and fruits, etc. they will pick up even that little bit of moisture and soften and swell. I don't keep nuts in my salad bar unless I'm going to eat them within a day. Instead, I keep the nuts and seeds that I like to add to my salad in their own separate container, which is just another divided storage container. I set it out on the table along with our salad bar, then I just have to put the lid on it and put it in our pantry for another day. Dried fruits, such as cranberries, are good to store in the pantry with the nuts, too. And they taste great on salads!
How to Prep Vegetables for a Great Salad Bar
Here's how to prepare some of the most common foods for a salad bar, and how to make them last for a week.
Cucumbers
1. Cut cucumbers into quarters lengthwise.
2. Cut out seeds in the center
3. Cut seedless cucumber strips into smaller bite sized pieces.
Tomato, Broccoli
Cherry tomatoes: 1. Do not cut in half. Exposing the seeds will make them spoil quickly. Store whole tomatoes in the salad bar.
Broccoli or cauliflower: Cut broccoli or cauliflower florets into small bites sized pieces, by cutting up through the stem. You lose less of the floret that way.
Radish, Egg
Radish: 1. Cut large radishes into slices or quarters.
Egg: Using hard boiled eggs, slice or dice them into bite sized pieces.
Carrots
1. Cut into thin slices or quarters, OR...
2. Buy pre-shredded carrots from the grocery store (my favorite).
3. If your carrot is very large, the slices can be cut into fun shapes using a sharp bento cutting tool. Flowers are the most successful shape with carrot slices.
Cheese
1. Cut into small cubes or shreds, or...
2. Cut into slices, then use a bento cutting tool to make cheese shapes. We like to use flowers in the spring and summer, leaves or pumpkins in the fall, and snowflakes in the winter.
Frozen Peas, Corn, or Edamame
1. Add to the salad bar as is - frozen. They will thaw slowly in the fridge or in about 30 minutes at room temperature.
2. Or, defrost in the microwave in a small glass container, then add to the salad bar.
Bell Pepper
1. Cut out the stem and the core, removing the seeds.
2. Cut into strips or bite sized pieces.
3. OR, buy mini bell peppers and cut them into slices. Discard any seeds.
Add Fun Shapes with Bento Tools
For the best results, use sharp metal cutters (especially for carrots). Here's where you can get some of my favorite mini bento cutters.
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How to Store Your Fresh Salad Bar so it Lasts All Week
To have a salad bar that can last all week, keep these things in mind:
- Make sure your containers are airtight - air can dry out food or cause bacteria to grow.
- Take a look at it every day - if you notice some condensation, lay a folded piece of paper towel just under the lid to help keep the food from getting wet, which will preserve it a little longer.
- Keep it in a cold part of the fridge if possible - The best spot is away from the door if your fridge gets opened and closed frequently.
If you make a salad bar, I'd love to hear how it turns out! Or if you have any salad bar related questions, I'm always happy to help! I came up with this idea in 2012, and have been using it ever since. You can even see my original OG salad bar that I used back then.
Leave me a comment below or ask me your questions. I will answer them!
Salad Dressings and Salad Toppings
Recipe creator: Kristie Winget, who loves gardening, singing, Fair Isle knitting, and making vegetables more exciting! 😂 Here's a little more about me.
Pam C. says
I love this post. It has such great ideas for keeping salad makings at the ready. Easy access means they'll get eaten more often.
Elizabeth Cyrilla Shaw says
Great idea for making a salad bar, simple even my boys could do it!
beneficialbento says
It is a fun thing to have kids help with, and they can cut veggie shapes that fit the current season or holiday 🙂 I hope your family has fun with it!
Sarah Howard says
Hi there..I love love love your Bento boxes, an your salad bar idea is awesome!! Do you have a Bento lunchbox book on the way? if you don't you should definitely publish one as your photos and ideas are great! I am an English girl living in Spain, and have just had a baby! Being home with baby I have spent many hours Googling all things healthy..including all the scary detergent stories (Pandoras box) air fresheners, food additives etc and everything else that is bad for us that I am slowly digging up (arrghhh!). I am cooking all of my baby food fresh, and spend HOURS in the kitchen at the moment..often not having time to eat myself - healthy foods! I have been pining for ages for a compartment box for my salad..but had no idea it coul dbe so varied and great ( I make the same salad over and over!) I found your website and have spent hours reading your posts and enjoying your ideas! I never even knew about "bento" and wow..pandas and star-shaped carrotts? wow!!! blew my mind did the world of the Japanese Bento!! 🙂 Anyway....I have "copied" your salad bar successfully for a month or so now...and I have a question for you....do you ever put liquid in your salad bar? My beets, and pickled gherkin peppers were not enjoying being out of their vinegar..so I put some in with them..but not sure if it has made the ambience too humid? Also my carrots were drying up and so I put a little water in there....(suffice to say, my seeds all went soft - but they would anyway after 10 days) but what is your experience with adding water / vinegar to any of your salad bar?
Keep up the great work and I wish you could make my future kiddie lunch boxes!! Love Sarah xx
beneficialbento says
Wow, thank you Sarah! Congratulations on your new little one, isn't being a mother the best?
I do like to keep beets, canned beans, and other wet foods in my salad bar. I have some little containers with lids that fit inside the Rubbermaid containers that I use for my salad bar, so I just put lids on them. They are called Mini Dippers ( made by Easy Lunchboxes). I use those mainly to keep the nuts from getting soft. But I really like beets, so I just keep a separate larger container of beets in the fridge and I just pull it out when I grab my salad bowl and salad bar for meals.
It is quite a coincidence that you asked if I am writing any cookbooks - I am actually taking photos today for an upcoming book called Fresh Lunch Salads, and I will be making some more cookbooks in the near future, too! I have several ideas for gluten free cookbooks, allergy friendly bento lunch ideas for kids, and a few more. If only there were more hours in a day!
Working on a cookbook is such a time-consuming process, so I sat down to take a break. I read your nice comment, and it totally made my day - thank you!