It's summer and i love to eat salads (healthy, yummy, summery)
i make a good greek, tomato mozzerella, tuna (nicoise) and potato.

i also recently got into pasta & rice salads.

but now i am bored. I want to eat salads mon-friday as it is easy & healthier (on weekends i can eat other things which take more time to prepare)

so anyone have any good salad ideas, recipes? something easy as i am lazy...

just for starters i swear by delia's potato salad :

I love a salad with either Nusslisalat leaves or baby spinach with feta cheese and beetroot. It's an odd but very agreeable combo and is good with some crusty wholemeal bread.

I love curried rice salad with dried fruit and nuts, chopped up veg, garlic, herbs and spices to taste and lots of olive oil and a touch of vinegar and gherkin. Keeps well too.

Take a whole white onion, peel. Chop into thin slices.
Drizzle balsamic vinegar over the top with a touch of rock salt, leave to stand for about 20 minutes.

Peel an orange, again thin slices - pour white wine over it together with a touch of cumin and pepper. Leave to stand about 20 minutes.

Next 6 red radishes and 1 large carrot. dice the radish, grate the carrot.

Take everything into a big bowl and chuck a big torn up mozarella ball of cheese into the bowl.

Add half a cup of dark ale then sieve the ale back out of the bowl.

Add 2 parts oil to 1 part of the ale residue.

Take the salad put it in a blender at full speed, add the ale and oil.

Chuck it down the sink, order a Pizza. Job done.

I love cous cous salad. I cook sweet potato and peas, then remove, and then add stock powder and the cous cous. When cooked, break up with a fork and drizzel with olive oil. Then I mix it all together with sweetcorn and cubed red pepper.

oi, you had me thinking that was a nice recipe there...till the ale part..

vinegar? lemon juice? i like cous cous too, sweet potato, that is a new one...

Here is one I like

1. Marinate chicken filets in soya sauce, oil, lime peel including juice, white onion and pepper for about an hour
2. Boil bulgur in salted water and saffron for approximately 10 minutes on weak heat. Let it all cool off.
3. Rinse kidney beans, chop some cucumber, tomatoes and onion into small cubes - add everything to the bulgur (pepper and salt).
4. Grill the chicken filet in the oven until done (cut into slices).
5. Avocado dressing: Mix avocado, lemon juice, sour cream, salt, black pepper and white onion until smooth.
6. Top off the salad with some roasted sunflower seeds and black olives.

Good thread, I am looking for a salad that I can serve at a summer wedding.
Looking for something that is not too difficult to prepare for 30 people, and has some nice extra, perhaps original flavours

Try these:

Fig, mozzarella and proscuitto

New potato salad

Grilled vegetable salad

Cheers,
Nick

You can add dressing after if you like it that way. Kids generally like it without, I sometimes like it with.

The taste of the sweet potato is in the liquid, since cous cous only tastes like what you have cooked it in I made it once with saltanas and it was nice too.

keep the recipes coming!

on a side note, i find balsamic vinegar too powerful in most salads (plus it is expensive) so i use sherry or red wine vinegar - it doesn't overpower the other ingredients...

What about a bean salad with tinned broad beans, kidney beans and chick peas, finely chopped red onion, a little olive oil and red wine vinegar.

last night i made a swiss favourite:

cheese/wurst salad

it is pretty easy
buy 2-3 cervelats (peel off the skin and slice)
use any hard cheese you have (gruyere, tilsiter, appenzell, even cheddar)
cut into little strips
slice some red onion (optional)
slice some peppers (optional)
slice some gherkins or cornichons (optional)

make a mustard vinegrette or even use a store bought dressing.

pour over and toss to mix.(i add some chives to give it some colour)
season with salt, pepper.

it is that easy.

This is my favourite salad this season:

Lamb's lettuce (Nuesslisalat), crayfish (good, precooked ones from Aldi) and cherry tomatoes - drizzled with your favourite creamy dressing or thousand island.

One of my favourites from Avoca Càfe in Ireland -

Broccoli, feta, hazelnut and cherry tomato salad

110g hazelnuts
400g broccoli Florets
110 g feta cheese cut into cubes
225 g cherry tomatoes
200 ml of French dressing (olive oil, red wine vinegar, garlic, grainy mustard, honey)

Toast hazelnuts in hot oven then tip them into a tea towel and rub off skins. Cool then mix in a bowel with broccoli, cheese and cherry tomatoes.. toss with french dressing, add pepper.

I swear by my chicken cesar salad :-)

Cook two chicken breasts and cut into strips, or simply buy a precooked chicken from the supermarket and tear off the white meat.

make some croutons by gently frying diced up cubes of old hard bread that you have in the cupboard, or simply buy some pre made croutons in the supermarket. own made are nicest though.

grate some parmesan onto a plate, and make some parmesan shavings too for variety if you like.


for the dressing:
take large glass bowl
peel two cloves garlic
rub the garlic hard into and around the glass bowl, crushing it. this leaves a slight garlic residue in the bowl.
remove most of the garlic and dispose of it.
separate an egg yolk from its white and add the yolk, dispose of the white
add teaspoon of worcester sauce
add small tablespoon of dijon mustard (or a smaller amount of normal mustard but i like dijon the most)
add a teaspoon of lemon juice
mix well
add half a small cup of olive oil, bit by bit, stirring the whole while. A creamy sauce should result.

add iceberg lettuce or leaves of your choice
add croutons, chicken, and grated parmesan
give a good stir
add a drizzle more olive oil over the top if you wish and sprinkle the parmesan shavings too if you feel naughty.

Serve and certainly enjoy, or your money back!

Note: If you wish to stick to the letter of the law regarding cesar dressing, the original would have you add some chopped up anchovies to the bowl at the same point where you crush the garlic around the bowl. Not being an anchovy fan, i leave this out.

What about "Rucola salad"? Mmm, I love it. But rucola has such special taste (rich and peppery) I think you can love it or hate it

You need rucola, cherry tomatoes and dressing of olive oil, balsamic (or red wine) vinegar, salt and pepper. I use balsamic one but a friend of mine uses the red wine vinegar and it tastes good too.

Just clean and wash the rucola and tomatoes, cut tomatoes into halves and than add dressing.

I often add sweet corn, sometimes I add gamberi (shrimps), mozzarella and often also hard cooked egg.

I love the little rabbit fillets on baby leaf salad.

Make your salad as you like it.

Fry the fillets with smoked bacon cubes and mushrooms add garlic and freshly chopped flat leaf parsley. slice fillets and scatter all hot ingredients over the salad. Serve with crusty bread.

An alternative:

Clean and chop chicken livers into small pieces.

Season and dust with flour.

Fry fast and furiously on a high heat until the outside is brown and crispy.
Add to fave salad.

Croutons can be added to both dishes if desired.