At-Home Salad Ideas + Recent Meals (um, salads and pizza!)

Last week I mentioned that I would share more about salads this week. This is a little funny as I think all I do is share about salads (and pizza I guess). BUT! I am going to list my favorite at-home salad combinations so that you can make salads at home that you actually like to eat. I used to be that person who could never replicate a good salad at home. I don’t feel that way anymore as I really do like and enjoy the salads that I create.

First, some salads not made by me.

I had this salad at Town Bagel. I love it when we order the chopped salads at Town Bagel because I always get it with a maple raisin multigrain bagel on the side.

In the salad (although I am probably forgetting to list an ingredient):

Romaine
Roasted red pepper
Avocado
Chickpeas
Cucumber
Beets

I had this beet salad at Pete The Greek the other day for lunch. I’ve shared this salad before on the blog – it’s so good and loaded with beets, feta cheese, and chickpeas among other salad staples. The salad comes with warm pita bread so I always ask for a side of hummus too. I use the hummus for the pita bread and put some in the salad as well.

For the salads I make at home, I’m fairly basic with my ingredients but they are still always satisfying. While I do rotate my ingredients and randomly change the salad staples that I have in the house on occasion, here’s a good list of what I have been working with lately:

Organic Romaine
Organic Tomatoes (either cherry or plum tomatoes)
Asparagus
Corn
Feta Cheese
Avocado
Roasted Potatoes (either sweet potatoes, purple potatoes, or the mini potato mix from Trader Joe’s)
Dr. Praeger’s Veggie Burgers
Chickpeas
Lentils
Quinoa
Dressings

I like to combine any of the above ingredients to make a salad, chopping it all up before digging in.

I used to call this salad in the below picture, the Power Salad. This salad uses some of the ingredients listed above like roasted sweet potatoes, quinoa, roasted cherry tomatoes, and feta cheese.

I usually rotate chickpeas or lentils with quinoa as my protein source and then figure out the rest from there depending upon my mood. Again, it’s all so very basic, but easy to remember to have everything on hand and ends up really delicious.

I don’t like a lot of steps, I don’t even want to chop or cut things in advance any more than I have to! The simple fact that I dice and roast potatoes is a big enough step for me at this point! One day maybe I will cut up a cucumber again. The extra step right now doesn’t appeal to me.

Here are some various salad combinations using my staples:

Lettuce + tomato + feta cheese + avocado + chickpeas

Lettuce + tomato +roasted potatoes + quinoa + avocado

Lettuce + tomato +asparagus + veggie burger + chickpeas + avocado

Lettuce + tomato + asparagus + corn + lentils + quinoa + avocado

Lettuce + tomato + asparagus + roasted potatoes + quinoa + lentils + avocado

Lettuce + tomato + veggie burger + quinoa + roasted potatoes + avocado

Lettuce + tomato + feta cheese + asparagus + quinoa + corn + avocado

The combinations are endless! And sometimes, I add a slice of cinnamon raisin Ezekiel toast with either mashed chickpeas and avocado or melted mozzarella and tomato on the side.

I will end today’s post with a basic salad topped with leftover pizza from Cipollini. Cipollini is suddenly becoming my favorite restaurant.