Good health in a jar

Jar salads make brilliant work lunches or portable picnic salads. I've shared a few of my favourite combinations on my website here – or you can make up your own recipes using all your favourite ingredients.

Here are some tips that I find useful: 

 • Have everything prepped and ready to layer in before you start packing. There’s a bit of flexibility in the middle of the jar but it’s important to start with the dressing in the bottom. This means that it won’t sit on top of the other ingredients making them soggy and also that it neatly dresses the salad when you invert the jar into a serving bowl. It’s also a good idea to put any green leafy vegetables and herbs at the top of the jar so they won’t get bruised. In between layer in your other ingredients – I like to make sure that I include a pulse or wholegrain and a nut, dairy protein or lean meat.

• I like to make salads that fit one 4-5-cup capacity jar or two 2-3-cup capacity jars and make a lunch or light meal for two or a sustaining dinner for one. If you’re feeding more people you can easily scale the recipes up, or serve them with some extra protein to make a more substantial meal.

• If you’re making the salads to eat at home you can skip the jar step and just layer the ingredients straight into a bowl. Toss through the dressing just before serving.

• Salad jars keep well in the fridge for two or three days so if you make a few on a Sunday you can pull them out during the week for workday lunches. On a Sunday I like to prepare a big tray of roasted vegetables, such as kumara and pumpkin, and a pot of quinoa, brown rice, lentils or other grains or pulses so I can toss them through salads and midweek meals. 

• I use plenty of healthy grains and pulses in my jar salads so I've compiled a printable PDF (447KB) with a useful chart about grain and pulse cooking times and yields.

BE SALAD JAR SAVVY

One of the things I love the most about the concept of portable salad in a jar is how easy it makes it to pack a variety of ingredients and flavours into one meal. 

This is particularly beneficial if you’re considering the nutritional value of what you’re eating – not all foods are created equal and the more variation you can have in your diet in the way of vegetables, grains, seeds and nuts the better.

Certain combinations of foods can either assist or hinder our nutrient uptake and different foods have nutrients that help us in different ways. Having a cup of tea with a food rich in vitamin C is one of those negative combinations, for example, because the tannins in the tea prevent the uptake of the vitamin. On the other hand, foods that are high in vitamin C are useful for helping iron absorption, and eating nuts or yoghurt with your fruit helps your body absorb the vitamins in the fruit.

Knowing this can really help us get the most out of our diet. I’ve kept these interactions in mind when creating the salad jars in my summer annual Annabel Langbein A Free Range Life Endless Summer – and the best news is the combos taste great too!

Here’s a chart about some of health benefits of some common ingredients: