Spring mix, love it or hate it?
 

Personally, I detest the stuff, especially arugula. I used to like side salads when they consisted of normal lettuce, a tomato, and maybe some onion. Apart from Caesar salads and iceberg wedges, spring mix now seems to dominate all salads and produce aisles.

I'm guessing my opinion is in the minority. To those of you who like it, are you old enough to have experienced salads during the 80s and 90s?

I'm old enough. I like it. I prefer some crisper lettuce along with it. What's more important to me is #1 the dressing, followed by certain additions/toppings.
I get tired of any one type of green salad rather quickly. Need to change it up often.

Boring 🥱
I love all varieties of lettuce especially frisee, arugula, little gem, red leaf, romaine, butter, endive and everything in a spring mix.
What are you calling "normal lettuce "? Iceberg?

Butter lettuce, which is just Iceberg's fancier cousin, used to be my favorite, but even most grocery stores have stopped selling it (or at least promoting it). braslvr I too, like dressing...helps spruce up even the most boring salads. But, I'm reminded of the calorie count from the iceberg wedge at a steakhouse I dined at in Denver a few months ago....they managed to turn an innocent lettuce into a 1850 calorie culinary ecstasy.

LOL, I know. 2 tablespoons of a really nice blue cheese dressing is plenty for me on a medium sized salad and only has about 150 calories. The goodies I add tend to be low cal veggies, the most sinful being olives.

I hate lettuce and love arugula. My father is the opposite.

I enjoy it… I prefer iceberg or romaine because of younger memories. I’m also not super fussy for salad - I just love them.

I’m not crazy about bitter greens. I also don’t like stuff that squeaks in my mouth - I’m looking at you, raw spinach. Iceberg lettuce has nothing to offer. Baby greens, butter lettuce, green leaf, and romaine for me, please.

I'm old enough to have experienced salads even before that, doused in Wish Bone dressings, and when Ranch was not a.flavo(u)r, but merely a packet of seasoning made by the Hidden Valley Ranch, where you added the appropriate liquids and shook in a carafe.

So, spring mix is fine so long as it is not more than a small percentage of icky spinach. In fact, yesterday's salad lunch had a 100 percent arugula base for the greens.

So, to directly answer the topic,.spring mix is fine enough.

The thing that I really don't like about Spring Mix is that it does not have a very long fridge life by any means, I am never able to finish a container of it because it doesn't have stable contents. Someone mentioned the spinach aspect (and why I usually allocate spinach to sauteed w/garlic and and go through the leaves prior to doing so. But, that is not what goes slimy first, its that red and green leaf lettuce that goes slimy first and ruins the mix. I actually have started using arugula by itself more, I like the spiciness and it lasts a bit longer than spring mix or to mix with my go to, which is romaine because its got the crispness and can handle some time in the fridge

I do the metal bowl & aluminum foil trick for keeping lettuce fresh and it is not that great with the more tender and delicate lettuces. And all the red leaf ones are the first to slime.

This is particularly an issue with the Costco packages. My theory (as this often occurs prior to the use-by date) is that these items have frequently been subjected to sub-freezing temps at points during transport/storage and the thaw makes those more tender leaves rot almost immediately.

Even the delicate lettuce (red leaf, oak leaf, baby red romaine) that i get at the farmer market rots sooner than sturdy lettuce. I always dry off my lettuce when I get home & put it in a metal bowl covered tightly with foil. Gets me a few more days.

I’ll eat any of it as long as it’s not bagged! Sometimes that has a horrid taste and I refuse to buy it on the chance!

Speaking of Wish Bone - their Red Wine Vinaigrette is my go to!

I'm indifferent to "spring mix". I like all lettuces and love arugula. But I agree with others here that those soft red lettuces get slimy very quickly and ruin a whole mix. I don't buy the bags much any more if full heads are an option. I've found that the heads of romaine and iceberg last the longest, but of course are the least interesting too. We buy the spring mix typically only when we're going to use it immediately.

The last couple years we've grown a green leaf lettuce and arugula in our raised garden beds. Far superior to anything we buy at the supermarket, even if its only for a few weeks.