Hands Are All You Need To Toss Up The Perfect Salad

If you like to eat healthy, salads may be a big part of your weekly rotation. Even if you stick to bagged pre-washed greens, eventually you're probably going to have to whip out a kitchen tool or two to make your salad. You'll want a knife to slice tomatoes and chop onions, and a salad spinner to ensure your greens are thoroughly dried. However, when it comes to combining all the ingredients with the dressing, there's only one tool that truly excels: your hands.

While most people will use two spoons or tongs to coat the ingredients of a salad with dressing, there are a few drawbacks. Using tongs to toss those lovingly sourced and sliced ingredients will only damage them, says Chef Daniel Patterson of the two-Michelin-starred restaurant Coi in San Francisco. "Tongs are a really brutal way of handling food," he said in an interview with The Splendid Table. "They're not sensitive to the food, they're kind of rough around the edges and they tend to tear things." 

Aside from avoiding damage, Chef Daniel Patterson advocates using your hands to mix salad ingredients for additional reasons. He explains that your hands can perceive the food in a way that tongs cannot. They provide more accurate and consistent sensory information. While tongs may be entertaining for showmanship, they cannot replace the effectiveness of clean hands. According to Patterson, clean hands are more tender, ensuring thorough mixing of the leaves. "They are going to be soft, they're going to be gentle in how they do it, and they're going to mix the leaves completely," he said.

Your hands are also perfect tools for preparing some of the ingredients that go into your salad. If you've tried to cut feta or Gorgonzola cheese you will notice that your hands do a better job of getting perfect crumbles. And when it comes to lettuce, there is an old wives' tale that cutting it with a knife will bruise the leaves. Alas, this is only a myth, so feel free to use your trusty chef's knife or hands for this job.

But hold on, isn't cooking with your hands considered unsanitary? Shouldn't you wear gloves instead? Cooking and preparing food with your hands is perfectly acceptable, as long as you follow certain precautions. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) recommends frequent handwashing, especially while cooking. Be sure to lather up with soap, scrub for at least 20 seconds, rinse, and thoroughly dry your hands before touching any food or in between tasks. 

Plus, how you handle the type of lettuce you use will ultimately make all the difference in the safety of your meal, regardless of what you use to toss the salad. You'll want to buy lettuce that is free from bruising and keep it away from other household items in shopping bags. If you buy lettuce that isn't labeled then it will need a thorough rinsing; some kinds of leaves need as much as three soaks in water to remove all of the dirt and potential bugs. Pre-washed greens that are labeled as ready-to-eat don't need to be rinsed before use. In fact, doing so could actually introduce contaminants from your kitchen to the lettuce. And, as always, wash your hands with soap and water before handling any type of food.