Salad Ideas

[Alixw]

at this time of year with the hot weather, i hate eating hot food for dinner, so i turn into a complete salad fiend!!

i'm not exactly imaginative and creative though when it comes to making them!

What's your favourite salad so i can steal your idea!?

[hammerman]

Finely chopped iceberg lettuce as a bed with beetroot, spring onions, cherry tomatoes, cucumber, cold ham, hard boiled egg, new poratoes and strong mature cheddar.

Smothered in salad cream !!!

[China Doll]

Leaf or iceberg with spring onions, olives, a heap of avocardo, green olives, cherry tomatoes and a mustard and honey dressing.

Or...

Leaf or iceberg, spring onions, green olives, avocardo, mushrooms, warm bacon and balsamic vinegar

YUM!

[n00dles]

SWEET SALAD

Lettuce, tomato, beetroot + spring onion

Cut, dice, chop (very small) [tear the lettuce - in case the food police are watching!]

Mix all together in a bowl, add gran sugar, vinegar, salt + pepper. Stir and leave few minutes to let the juices mingle....

Goes with cold meats, seafood, tuna/salmon and cheese...

Quantity of veggies depending on for how many and how hungry you are.......Adjust any condiments to suit your taste, but remember not too much vinegar, else it won't be a "sweet salad!"

[Mortartube]

I like this one. I buy a cooked chicken from the supermarket deli and pick it apart when it's cold. I also use a little balsamic vinegar instead of the mentioned salad dressing. it's lovely.

http://www.kraftfoods.com/recipes/PoultryEntre es/Salads/GrilledChickenandMangoSalad.html

[Plocket]

I do what we call "Hunter Valley Salad" because of where we first ate it:

1 small butternut squash peeled, cubed, roasted and cooled
1 bag baby spinach leaves
1 packet chopped cherry tomatoes
1 avocado cubed
1 packet unsmoked streaky bacon cooked until crisp then chopped
Shavings of parmesan

Put all the incredients in a bowl a mix well. No dressing is required.

[flip-flop]

Artichokes in Olive Oil - Sacla do a great one.

[mccfluff]

sam posted this link in an earlier answer, its got some pretty good and varied ideas

http://www.recipegal.com/salad/

[tinkertontom]

all the above ideas plus try a tin of sweet pineapple mixed in delicious

[whiffey]

Splash out and treat yourself to a Marks and Spencer ready salad (with all the lumpy bits, egg, potatoes, tomatoes, etc), M&S traditional corned beef (the lowest fat corned beef I have ever seen - 8%), M&S salad cream, and only because M&S don't do one, Encona extra hot chilli sauce.
Loads of white pepper.

[tradey]

tomato, onion and fetta cheese salad with bit of olive oil for a change from bread or barms have it in a pitta bread its great yummy

[ladygolfer]

I agree with Mortatube. Balsamic Vinegar transforms any salad. Supermarkets have a Pizza Express version which is a bit thicker! Try it !

[lynlockwood]

I like a nicoise type salad with olives, cooked cold green beans, hard boil egg, cold new potatoes, green leaves and some cold salmon or chicken (which is cheating a bit). A good tip is to get stuff out of the fridge a while before you want to eat it so it is nearere room temp and has m uch more flavour esp tomatoes, cucumber. Avocadoes and walnuts are nice together too. Yum!

[hammerman]

As Tradey says.....put it in pitta bread or make a mini salad as with any of the above and put it in a tortilla wrap.....maybe with a sweet sauce such as plum or cranberry sauce.

[Makinamess]

Potato Salad Boil new potatoes until cooked, drain, halve or quarter, season and add mayo whilst potatoes are still hot, add finely chopped onion (or spring onions) and chopped fresh chives or parsley. Leave to cool - may need more mayo as it soaks into the potato.

Rice Salad Cook brown rice until soft, add cooked sweetcorn, cooked peas, cooked red kidney beans and salted peanuts with a little french dressing. Serve chilled.

Cracked Wheat Salad Soak cracked wheat (bulgar wheat) for about half an hour, drain and press excess water out. Add chopped onion, tomato, cucumber, celery, parsley and a little french dressing. Serve chilled.

You could always use cooked pasta (eg the little shells) instead of the rice or cracked wheat to ring the changes and if you like other crunchy vegetables like peppers or raw carrot you could use them instead :)

[aurelia]

I love just rhrowing together all kinds of different lettuce as although I love iceberg it doesn't have a lot of flavour and is supposed to not have as many vitamins. I add 3 tablespoons oil to 1 tablespoon vinegar - I love balsamic vinegar so use it mostly now. I drizzle the dressing over the rinsed lettuce and toss the salad through the oil before adding to plate. I often use this on its own when I have chops as an accompaniement along with a small baked potato.

I love puting in raw sliced mushrooms, tomatoes, cucumber, spring onions, peppers, etc when having a salad before adding dressing mixture. I always use Rapeseed Oil in my mix as it is low in saturates. Other "good" oils are Olive Oil or Extra-Virgin but Extra-Virgin has a strong flavour which neither myself or my family like in a dressing. I have family in France who have given me tips on making dressing. Some people add a teasppoon of mustard into oil and vinegsar and mix like mad.

another thng I have recently started making by accident actually - more a throw everything in and see how it goes which worked really nice - was butternut squash peeled and cut into chnks and slices, sweet potaotes cut into wedges and ordinary potaotes cut into wedges.

I pIaced these face down in 2 oval enamel containers poured balsamic vinegar over the lot and cooked at Gas mark 8 for 40 minutes - they tasted gorgeous if I do say so myself. Notice the trend for balsamic vinegar.

These tasted gorgeous cold as well so were used remainders for an accompianement to a salad - yummy scrummy - mmmmmmmmmmmm us making me hungry and my mouth's watering just thinking asbout it

[Makinamess]

Wow Aurelia - that mixture of squash, sweet and standard potato in balsamic vinegar sounds fabulous, I would never have thought of doing that ! I think "yummy" must be a slight understatement there !! Agree with the extra virgin olive oil - I once made a mayonnaise with the stuff - it was so strong I had to throw it away and make a fresh batch using groundnut oil.

[lynlockwood]

Add a spoonful of natural yoghurt to the potato salad recipe above to make it really tangy along with the mayo.

[Alixw]

Oooh thanks you lot, they all sound lovely, some great ideas there!

Can't wait to try them out! X