How to Cut Romaine Lettuce (Video Tutorial) + Our First Date
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Here’s a quick video tutorial on how to cut romaine lettuce – go figure, there’s a proper way! You’ll waste less lettuce and probably stop buying the bagged lettuce because it’s so easy!
My husband, Vadim taught me this method. He worked in Chilis restaurant for 5 years way back when we were dating. Actually the first place he took me out was Chilis. Here’s the scene. I was 15…
I was 15, my 14 year old sister Anna was tagging along, and my older man (who was a whopping 19 at the time) took us out to Chilis and bought us lunch I think he wanted to show off his new girlfriend from Idaho to his friends and trust me I was happy as a clam to have an older hunk from California.
Here’s a picture from the dating scrapbook that I created when I was about 16. I love how completely dorky and innocent this was, i.e. “hot hot hot.” Go on and laugh. Yeah I used stickers and calendar cutouts in my scrapbooks and I am not ashamed (ok, maybe a little bit). Are you totally surprised that I never continued in scrapbooking? Anyway, I hope you’re chuckling.
After lunch, the “date” continued as Anna chaperoned us to the park. Anna, I’m so sorry for sharing this photo of you. I laughed until my pregnant belly ached when I was looking at it.
Your shorts are stellar and the best part is, you were borrowing them from me! Even better, my boyfriend was wearing socks with sandals. Those were simpler times. lol. Ouch, my belly.
How to Cut Romaine Lettuce:
Ok ok, on to the video tutorial. I hope you remember this tip next time you chop yourself some salad. It’s so quick and easy and very little lettuce is wasted.
Do you subscribe to our YouTube Cooking Channel? It gets us all pumped and excited to keep posting video recipes and tutorials. Thanks a gazillion my sweet friends!
Belly Update:
I have 2 days until my due date. I’m so excited! My last appointment was 2 days ago and I’m making some progress :). My hospital bag is packed and I’m waiting for contractions to become regular :). Have a super awesome day!
♥ FAVORITE THINGS ♥
Shown in this post: (nope, no one paid us to write this; just stuff we love):
* I use my Wusthoff Classic Ikon Chef’s knife for everything.
*Reversible Cutting Board by John Boos 20 by 15 by 1.5-Inch, Maple
Natasha Kravchuk
Hi! I'm Natasha Kravchuk. Here you'll find delicious, trusted recipes with easy step-by-step photos and videos. 
Love this tip.😄
I’m so glad it was helpful!
Haha so simple yet I didn’t even know the proper way
I hope this helped!
Hi Natasha,
This is a bit irrelevant to the actual content but I wanted to ask you how you organized the video section of the blog. Is there a plugin that automatically updates the page very time you post a video recipe?
Good question :). We photoshoped the thumbnails for those posts to have the video “button” in the center and then we put those posts into the category of video. Then we made a page that featured just the video category and so those thumbnails generate on that page. I hope that makes sense.
Who would have ever thought there’s a correct way to cut lettuce!! I wish I watched this before my Caesar salad that I made the other day, in which I clearly cut my lettuce the wrong way
I don’t know if there’s necessarily a wrong way, but this one wastes less lettuce and it’s easy. 🙂
Of course he took you to Chili’s on your first date, Val took me there on the second (lol) 🙂
P.S. Got to love the rybashka 🙂
Lol. Now I have to know where was your first date? Yeah that rybashka was very modna,… I think. lol.
Hi Natasha! Congrats on your baby 🙂 I hope you are able to get some much needed rest after the delivery.
As for the post, I’m glad to see that you removed the core of the lettuce. Often I see people leave it in. Not only does it taste awful, it makes it nearly impossible to clean the lettuce properly.
Cheers!
Thank you so much Justin. 🙂 We are so happy to be back home now – it’s much more restful than at the hospital.
Wow! I didn’t know there’s a special way to cut the lettuce. Thanks for the tip Natasha, it’ll save me some time because it looks so easy! May God bless your delivery and your growing family. Thanks for all you do for us. I just love your recipes! And hope your baby girl comes soon, I remember that anxious feeling of wanting it out
Thank you so much Vika :). Was your baby overdue also? I’m 4 days over now and yes I’m seriously hoping it’s soon! 😉
Love the pics and story – you two are too cute!
Question about the lettuce though.
The Romaine hearts I buy say (on the bag) to rinse before use. How do you get a good rinse and not take them apart first? Will enough water come out/off if you use a spinner before cutting like in the video?
Hi Cathy,
You can do it either way – you can core the romaine lettuce and then wash the large leaves or you can completely chop the romaine lettuce like I did in the video then rinse and spin dry with the salad spinner (which is what we usually do). A good salad spinner will spin it almost completely dry.
Finished a bit of studying and came out of my cave to check out this beauty! This post actually makes me feel better about my dating and wedding photos because every time I show them to people they say with a gasp,”You both look like children!” Okay maybe we looked young but you did look like super adorable children! Loved the post of course! 🙂
Lol thanks Julia. At least we were adorable children. I think it’s totally a cultural thing too and also depends alot on the individuals. I was pretty responsible and level-headed when I was married at 18 🙂
Lol thanks Julia. At least we were adorable children. I think it’s totally a cultural thing too and also depends alot on the individuals. I was probably way too mature for my own good when I was married at 18 🙂
I LOVE the pictures! You and I are around the same age, so I can totally relate to the fashion sense in the photos 😉 LOL! They remind me of pictures I have of my husband and I. We started dating when we were 16 and 18 (now 28 and 30) and I feel like it’s so amazing that love lasted through all the teenage years. Have a safe and healthy delivery. I’m sure little one will be gorgeous.
That’s so cool that we have similar stories :). Thank you so much for your sweet words. We’re so excited about meeting our baby girl. She is due today. I guess she’ll come out when she’s good and ready 😉
I love your first date stuff! It is so cute! And an early congrats on the baby!
Thank you so much Shelby. The due date is tomorrow. My son was born on his due date so I’m hopeful 😉
Nice story!! You should post up a wedding picture
That’s a great suggestion! I don’t think I’ve ever shared a wedding picture on my blog 🙂 Thank you Maria 🙂
oooo goodness this brought so much memories to the time you guys were dating.. aww the good ol times.. loving this!!!
Awww the good old days. I’m so happy to have known you since 8 years old. You are a one-of-a-kind true friendship and I just love you my dear. 🙂 Pardon my overly emotional state. lol.
Wow! That’s cute! How did you meet him at such a early age? I have 15 and 16 year old girls, I don’t think I’m ready for them to be dating 🙂 It’s hard for me to believe that the oldest is already working, passed her drivers ed and will have her license soon. Love the idea of easy cutting lettuce 🙂
Valya, I remember telling myself I wouldn’t have a boyfriend until I was 17 and then I met Vadim at 15 :). It was very innocent and sweet. We “dated” long distance for 3 years and I got married at 18. We were both so young, but I don’t regret it one bit. It’s been such a blessed life together. My husband is a true gem of a man – loves the Lord, awesome Father and always spoils me :). I am so thankful that I met him when I didn’t care that he wore socks with sandals. lol. And he didn’t care that I didn’t wear makeup.
Wore socks and sandal…lol. Wasn’t that totally normal those days? Love it!Настоящая простота! I actually really miss to see youth like your describing. Although in our house we are still little old fashioned…. no make up, etc. Always happy to hear about happy marriage life. I’m very happy in marriage too, thank God!!! Although I got married at almost 20. 🙂 Dentist I was working for at that time told me that that’s too early 🙂
Natasha, the bible verses cracked me up. I love how you are trying to relate love to them 🙂 You guys are adorable.
Lol. Yeah cut me a little slack – I was 15. Ha ha. I know it and I even wrote some of them out in Russian. My scrapbooking skills were definitely “special”
I think it’s cute! lol.. You made my non pregnant ached from laughing. 😉
LOL you just made my day with this post!! I, too, still laugh hard every time I look through my album and see my teenage years…how times have changed. I like how you had your sister as your chaperone 🙂 thumbs up to your parents! I bet your sister enjoyed tagging along for a free lunch 🙂 I wish you a healthy and good delivery and a fast recovery. How exciting that any day now you will meet your little girl. That was my favorite part as I got closer to my due dates: the long awaited meeting with my baby. You will be in my thoughts and prayers in the days ahead.
Ha ha! I know she did enjoy that “date” with us. I think our parents did a great job raising us girls. They raised five girls all one year apart. I can only imagine what was going through their minds when they were marrying us off one by one it seems like every year plus my sister and I got married in the same year. 🙂 thank you so much for your super thoughtful comment. It means a great deal to me and God bless you for it!
Awww,u guys r so cute! Dont u jus lov lookin at old pictures,? I do,brings so much memories!! Me and my now husband too started dating when I was 15,and he was 19!!!
That’s awesome!! I love that we have a similar story :-). We also “dated” long distance for 3 years before we got married and that’s a whole other story 🙂 I absolutely love to look at old pictures. You can’t help but smile and remember all the good times from the past. This is especially the case before the digital era when you couldn’t look at the pictures before you printed them. There are some seriously funny shots in some of my albums.
The scrapbook is so adorable!!
Haha thank you! I was pretty proud of my efforts back in the day. Lol.
15 and 19 is considered illegal:)) how long did you date for? Cute story.
It’s only illegal if you are doing what you aren’t supposed to be. Times were very different then 🙂 holding hands was a big deal 🙂 thanks Marina!
Hi Natasha! I loved your first date story, made me smile and remember how innocent us girls are at 15 years old. Thank you for the pregnancy update! God bless you and your baby girl! Hope you have a safe and healthy delivery and fast recovery!
Thank you so much! I wish I could say the world hadn’t changed since then. 15 years old now is not what it was back then. Although I hope I am wrong. It was a very innocent time. 🙂
I guys look so cute!! How did u meet?
Thanks for the awesome posts. God bless ur delivery and ur little baby girl! Excited to see it next post with ur princess!!
Thank you so much for your nice comment! We met in Idaho at our youth car wash when he came to visit his third cousin here and that is another story that I’ll need to share in the future. 🙂
Omg, I love reading this! You looked wonderful as a 15 y.o, I still can’t look at my teenage pics without bursting in laugh and tears! Lol. But sometimes it fun.
Wishing you an easy and safe delivery, healthy baby girl and quick recovery for you! You are almost there! God bless!!!
I laugh at my teenage pictures too. I have one with an especially adorable haircut which was a Bob gone wrong. I will muster up the guts to post it one day so everyone can have a good laugh with me. lol. Thank you for the blessings and sweet comment 🙂
Awesome pictures! You look like natalie portman! Beautiful:)
You’re so sweet 🙂 thank you!
ha ha ha!!! my concern is, how did he manage to wrap his arm around you so soon!!! lol
definitely good memories!!
Whoops! Oh dear 🙂
You guys look so cute and young in that picture! I wish you a quick and easy delivery! I am due April 21st!
Ha ha yeah we were very young when we fell in love :). Congratulations! That’s so soon too! I’m so excited for you and God bless your pregnancy and delivery :).
Oh the pictures… they made my day. Thanks for a good laugh, I needed it.
I’m glad. lol. Your comment made mine 😉