If there’s one color we’re inclined to affiliate with lettuce, it’s…undoubtedly not pink. Visualize a head of crisp, inexperienced romaine that you just simply’re chopping for a salad. You use half the highest, and put the remaining once more inside the crisper. A pair days later, when you seize a few leaves to prime a sandwich, you uncover it’s turned pink throughout the perimeters. In case you’ve ever prepped lettuce—notably romaine or iceberg—this is not an imaginary state of affairs. It’s occurred to all of us. Nevertheless why does lettuce flip pink when it’s decrease?
Why Does Lettuce Flip Pink After Being Decrease?
It’s a totally pure post-harvest trait, explains Katie Sabatini, RD, LDN, Meals Safety & Top quality Assurance Supervisor at Little Leaf Farms. Sometimes generally known as “rusting,” this happens when the lettuce oxidizes polyphenols (a category of health-beneficial plant compounds) as a defending measure in the direction of spoilage. In several phrases, the lettuce is defending itself from quick deterioration. Sabatini says that rusting may be attributable to further moisture and publicity to ethylene gas, a naturally-emitted plant hormone current in abundance in fridges.
“Lettuce can flip pink at any stage after harvesting,” says Sabatini, nevertheless notes that it’s further extra more likely to occur in a bag or container that’s been opened and put once more inside the fridge. Bruised or decrease leaves expedite the rusting course of, too.
Is It Safe to Eat Lettuce that Has Turned Pink?
Yep! Utterly safe. It moreover shouldn’t type any utterly completely different. “If the discoloration bothers you, you can always decide any pinkish leaves for a further attention-grabbing meal,” says Sabatini. To verify your lettuce stays to be good to eat, focus further on the texture: “Study that the rest of the leaves are nonetheless crisp, and they also appear vibrant and company. In that case, you can nonetheless benefit from your greens as you often would,” Sabatini says, together with that in case you uncover a serious amount of slimy or soggy greens, discard the rest of the bundle deal to be on the safe facet.
How Do You Stop Lettuce from Turning Pink?
On account of further moisture is a offender of rusting, solely wash lettuce leaves as wished, as an alternative of batch-washing them and inserting soggy or damp leaves once more inside the fridge. In case you really have to prep a bunch prematurely, use a salad spinner to get rid of as quite a bit water as potential. And keep the lettuce away from completely different greens, in a appropriately sealed container or in a separate crisper drawer, to stay away from publicity to ethylene gas.