New Dole Vegan Bountiful Salad Kits!

Confession: I love bagged salad. I know it's more economical (and more zero waste) to opt for whole heads of lettuce, but there are few kitchen tasks I hate more than washing lettuce. I hate it so much that I've been known to skip that step and just eat the dirty lettuce right off the head. I'm sure that's not a good idea though, and it often results in me getting a mouthful of grit!

I've come to accept that, if I'm going to get in my daily bowl of fresh greens, it has to be in bagged salad form. Even more convenient is when the salad toppings also come in the bag, but so many salad kits contain cheese or non-vegan dressings. Sure, you can leave some toppings off, but I want the full experience! And now I can get that with Dole's New Vegan Bountiful Kits! There are two new vegan kits in their salad line — Lentil Cucumber and Triple Quinoa. They sent me a few bags to review.

The Lentil Cucumber kit features a salad mix with green leaf, iceberg, red cabbage, and radish, plus a little package of marinated green, black, and red lentils. The dressing is a tangy, cooling cucumber vinaigrette.

The bag says this makes several servings, but I ate the whole bag as one meal! You could dress this up with additional veggies, but I had it as is and it was filling (with a side of pita and hummus).

The Triple Quinoa was my fave! It's a kale salad with a kale-carrot blend, a topping made from red, white, and black quinoa and chickpeas, and a refreshing lemon-basil vinaigrette. I massaged the kale a bit and let it sit overnight, so it was perfect and tender the next day for lunch. Again, I ate the whole bag as one meal.

One tip: I try to limit my oil intake, so I used half of the dressing on both of these salads, and it was PLENTY to add flavor. You could use the whole thing, but I don't think that's necessary.

These salads are GREAT! And I will definitely buy them when I see them in the store. Anything to make my salad-eating habit easier!