We had our first salad from the new, spring-planted lettuces yesterday—a carnival of colours and flavours!

It got me thinking about salad, and the preparation of salad.

Which of course, led me to think about salad spinners.

Now, I don’t own a TV, so I don’t know if there are still salad spinner commercials, but I remember back in the 1980s when they were all the rage—fancy machines that spun your salad leaves dry. A quick Google search tells me that salad spinners are still out there, though whether they rank as such a gourmet sort of tool anymore or not, I have no idea.

Growing up, I never considered the water on my lettuce leaves. You washed it, gave it a good shake, and that was that.

But when I married, I found my husband prefers dry lettuce. I wasn’t about to buy a salad spinner, and I wasn’t going to put my lettuce in the spin cycle of the washing machine, as I’ve heard some people do (What?!).

Instead, we use a high-tech, oh-so-fancy way of spinning our salad.

Remember when you were a kid and you learned the trick where you swing a bucket full of water around without spilling a drop? Now, put your salad greens in a tea towel (I use my cheese cloths—they’re perfect!), hold onto the corners, step outside, and do the same. A few good twirls, and your salad greens are nicely dried.

Best of all, the kids LOVE doing it, especially if they get to spray a sibling with the water as they whip the towel around. One more dinner preparation task Mum doesn’t have to do!