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Supermarket salad bags can rarely compete with the wonderful diversity of leaves found on small farms. The former are often made up of only two to four types of leaf (spinach, sweet batavia or butterhead, maybe some rocket and a bitter leaf such as frisée), compared with the incredible range of eight to 12 varieties found in a good farm salad bag. That said, this test did teach me that some brands are starting to include more exotic leaves in their mix.
I awarded points for leaf diversity and, more importantly, flavour (it’s incredible how the same leaf variety tastes so different from one packet to another, from nutrient-dense and alive to bland and flavourless). Freshness is also a crucial factor, of course, as is value for money. Sadly, though, compared with other fresh supermarket products such as strawberries and tomatoes, few brands display much by way of transparency or provenance. Most list, at best, a country of origin, with several offering nothing more than just “red and green lettuce” on the ingredients list, leaving me to try to identify the varieties myself.
The best supermarket baby leaf salad bags
Best overall:
G’s organic mixed leaves
★★★★☆
A decent variety of at least three unwashed leaves with very sweet baby spinach, and baby red and green batavia. The packet says the contents may vary seasonally, so a bag might well contain other leaves (mine had some rocket), which I like, not least because it’s rare to find seasonality in supermarket produce. Grown in the UK and EU, this is the only organic (Soil Association-certified) salad mix in the test.
Best bargain:
Aldi Nature’s Pick rocket & baby leaf salad
★★★★☆
A varied, four-leaf bag of mizuna, baby spinach, lollo rosso (or similar) and rocket. Sweet and flavourful with a peppery, citrus and mustard twang from the rocket and mizuna. Really good value.
And the rest …
Morrisons the Best butterhead, pea shoots, chard & sorrel
★★★★☆
An attractive, aromatic and delicious combination of curly pea shoots, colourful and crisp red butterhead, zesty red sorrel and chard. Its origin (Yorkshire in this instance) is listed on the packet, too.
M&S Collection citrus sorrel baby leaves
★★★★☆
A distinctively different salad mix with a wonderfully sour green sorrel and pretty, bitter, red-veined sorrel, combined in a tasteful ratio with frilly and round-headed leaves. Vertically farmed in Italy. It must be good, because I ate the whole bag like a packet of crisps. My best splurge.
Waitrose Essential mixed salad
★★★☆☆
An entry-level, two-leaf mix of classic frilly green and red leaves. Textural, with thin fronds and a classic, bitter edge.
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Fresh & Naked baby leaves
★★★☆☆
An unwashed four-leaf mix full of nourishing flavour, including a mustardy wild rocket, notably creamy baby spinach, citrussy baby red chard and red oak-leaf lettuce. Colourful and delicious, but has mixed reviews online, so check for freshness before buying.
Sainsbury’s Italian-style salad
★★★☆☆
A diverse, four-leaf mix, featuring sweet and mild red cos, a bitter green chicory-like leaf, peppery rocket and succulent spinach. A balanced but simple flavour profile that’s so nourishing I couldn’t stop eating it.
Unbeleafable mixed baby leaves
★★★☆☆
A faintly bitter and sweet mix of crunchy-stemmed leaves, including frisée and oak-leaf-style lettuce. Some oxidisation and damage, but OK quality overall. Vertically farmed in Kent without pesticides by GrowUp Farms, which is B Corp-certified.
Tesco mixed leaf salad
★★☆☆☆
A sweet, well-textured and simple two-leaf mix of red and green frilly lettuce (likely to be frisée and lollo rosso, or similar) with crisp stalks and a delicious, mildly bitter, savoury edge.
Asda beetroot, baby spinach & baby kale salad
★☆☆☆☆
A two-leaf mix with beetroot matchsticks. The beetroot is sweet, the kale mild and bitter, and the spinach has a luscious texture, but there’s a slight mustiness in the bag likely to be due to the cut beetroot, so check this has a long use-by before buying.
