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If you’re like me, you absolutely hate a wet salad. You want your lettuce and other greens to be as dry as possible. But, that’s hard to achieve. So, you use a salad spinner. That’s supposed to be the most efficient and practical way to dry lettuce. Only, it still takes forever! Why is your salad spinner so slow at drying lettuce? I’ll tell you why in this article.
But, first, it matters if you have a good salad spinner in the first place. If you have a cord-pull model, for example, well, it’s hopeless. They just don’t work as well as either a push-down or handle version and the first step would be to ditch the pull-cord model and go for a push-down model, which, in my experience, and according to user ratings, is still better than the kind with the rotating handle. Once you spin up a push-down or PUMP salad spinner, it will keep spinning on its own for quite a long time.
The OXO line of pump action salad spinners is a very good choice. The standard OXO Good Grips Salad Spinner with a plastic bowl will get the job done and accommodate a large head of lettuce and also easy to store, relatively speaking.
For a step up, go for the OXO Steel Salad Spinner. Why would you want a steel bowl in a salad spinner? Well know the practical reason in terms of using it to dry lettuce but, the steel bowl makes a great serving bowl so you can make your salad right inside the steel spinner bowl. It’s heavier though so this could be a drawback. Choose either one according to your preference or needs.
Of course, there are some expensive electric models but they are quite expensive and not very trustworthy. You would be dealing with an electric motor driven by a rechargeable battery. This can easily fail. And, will you really remember to charge up your salad spinner?
So, assuming you have a well-functioning and sturdy salad spinner, like the two I recommended, why does it take so long to dry lettuce and other green leafy veggies?
Salad Spinner Too Slow? Load It Up More
Well, if you are trying to dry something like parsley or cilantro, it’s going to take forever. OXO makes a smaller herb spinner for this. By the same token, if you are in the habit of just washing and drying a small amount of lettuce, say half a head of romaine, it’s also going to dry very slowly. So, have you guessed the problem? It’s the amount of stuff you are putting in the spinner. Basically, a large salad spinner will dry a larger (but not too large) amount of lettuce much more efficiently and quickly than a small amount. That’s it.
If you’ve been having this problem, then do the entire head of romaine. Tear or chop it up into manageable pieces, when practical, because this will also speed up the drying process. If you are drying entire leaves of lettuce, a salad spinner is not the greatest. Paper towels would probably work better.
Regardless, it’s all about physics. More weight equals more momentum which means better force along the sides of the bowl which pushes the water to the outer edges and down into the bowl itself. After washing it thoroughly in inside the basket in the bowl in the sink, fully submerged in water for two or three rinsings, I dry up a whole head of romaine and keep it handy in a plastic bag, open at the top, for quick salads. It takes just a few minutes. When I try to do lesser amounts it’s as if the lettuce never gets dry. So, there you go. Load it up with a whole head.
Now, if you are washing iceberg lettuce, a whole head of iceberg is much more than a head of loose-leaf lettuce. So, you have to use your judgment. You’ll quickly figure it out now that you know the basic trick. Don’t overload it to the top because then it’s all too heavy to spin up quickly at all. So, this is a goldi-locks thing. Not too heavy and not too light. You’ll have perfectly dry lettuce that the dressing will stick to and no puddles in the bottom of your lettuce bowl. Yuck!