Maybe If We Make Salad Easier To Assemble More People Will Eat It

Americans hate salad. And with good reason: it sucks. The joyless array of leaves, suitable only for irritatingly self-satisfied fitness freaks and those whom catastrophic illness has left bereft of a discerning palate, inspires existential despair while doing nothing to curb hunger. (Plus, everyone knows salad is full of doody.) But this poses a problem for the produce industry: how to foist its depressing product on a nation of suspicious consumers. They have a plan!

At Fresh Express Inc., a unit of Chiquita Brands International Inc., executives think adding more vegetables to bagged greens will get consumers to eat more salad. They are aiming to release a bagged salad that has not just lettuces but also cucumbers, tomatoes and red peppers, among other vegetables, by sometime next year. All shoppers will have to do is open, pour and eat.

This is probably a good start, given that the majority of American cuisine comes out of a package, but it is still one step too many. Perhaps they can develop a process where the pouring stage transfers the sad dirt harvest directly into the eater’s mouth. I mean, it probably wouldn’t make me more likely to eat salad, but I would at least feel a little more guilty about not doing so.