Baggage tales

Salad leaves that have been lovingly grown for flavour need to be fresh and crisp as long as possible if they’re not to go to waste.

In order to sell them we obviously need them to be bagged, and in choosing bags we’re trying to balance keeping the salad in great condition with using sustainable materials.

Normal plastic bags can fog-up in the fridge with the moisture from the leaves. They’re also single-use and not very environmentally friendly.

Compostable bags made from plant fibre are environmentally sustainable, but tales abound of the biodegradable ones falling apart in the fridge with the humidity and dampness of the leaves. Combined with which they’re often difficult to compost at home.

Micro-perforated ppl bags seemed to be a good compromise, allowing produce to breathe and being fine to refrigerate. Sadly though, our home trials have shown that the leaves don’t last in them, wilting after just a few days.

There doesn’t appear to be a perfect solution yet.

For now we’re using reusable stay-fresh produce bags with a sticker asking people to reuse the bag. The bag is impregnated with a porous, food safe, natural Japanese stone powder suspended in the polythene film; the powder absorbs the ethane gases that most fruit and veg release, and the bags let the contents breathe, creating an environment that helps produce stay fresher for longer.

The downside, because there is always one, is cost.

Whereas a standard plastic bag for food use is a few pence, a stay-fresh bag is much more. Not a problem if you’re using them at home and only going through a few a month, but if you’re packing produce in any volume it can get pricey.

I’ve found somewhere that I can bulk-buy them that makes them a bit cheaper, so we’ll trial these for a few months and see how they do.