Greek-ish. Yup. Why? Because I wanted to make Greek Salads to use some of our amazing homemade feta which just keeps getting more and more delicious as it ages, but I didn’t have any cucumbers and for some reason I decided that walnuts would also be delicious and add the necessary crunch. But when’s the last time you ever saw a Greek Salad with toasted walnuts? Right. Never. I go back to my previous statement: Greek-ish.
Did I mention how freakin’ amazing our homemade feta is? Seriously. It’s a lot of work but I cannot even begin to say how incredibly worth it it is. It’s at it’s 4th and supposedly final week, and it has certainly hit it’s prime. I couldn’t stop just eating it on it’s own. If you’re going to make some of your own cheese, feta is the cheese to make!
Anyway, back to the salad… First I did a light toast of the walnuts.
Then, a thin slice of half of a red onion…
…a slice of some olive bar black olives…
…and then I halved some grape tomatoes and tossed them on some freshly washed red leaf lettuce.
With the walnuts and olives thrown in the party, we’re on to the best part. The crumbling of the feta on top.
Aw yea.
To finish it off, a super simple lemon vinaigrette. Fresh squeezed lemon juice, a really nice olive oil, salt and pepper. Bam. Simple.
Poured on top of the beautiful bowl of deliciousness…
…then mixed…
whoa…
See how the feta just coats everything with the lemon vinaigrette dressing? Yea, that’s the ticket.
Hands down, the BEST salad I’ve ever made. The feta was so incredibly salty and creamy crumbly, the lemon vinaigrette added the perfect level of acid, and the seemingly totally out-of-place toasted walnuts added a nutty crunch. This was supposed to be a side salad to some roasted chicken I had in the oven, but we elected to just eat this salad for dinner and didn’t even eat the chicken. It was THAT good.
Ingredients
- 1 head of red leaf lettuce washed and ripped lettuce
- 1 pint of grape tomatoes halved
- 1 cup of pitted black olives sliced
- 1/2 red onion sliced thin
- 3-4 oz of feta cheese
- 1/2 cup of toasted walnuts
Lemon Vinaigrette
- 1/4 cup of fresh squeezed lemon juice
- 1/2 cup of good olive oil
- 1 teaspoon of kosher salt
- 1/2 teaspoon of fresh ground black pepper
Instructions
- To make the vinaigrette whisk together the juice, oil, salt, and pepper. Set aside.
- Prep the vegetables and then combined in a large bowl. Crumble feta on top. Drizzle 1/2 of the vinaigrette on salad and mix well. Add more vinaigrette for desired dressing level (we used just under 3/4 of the prepared amount).
My kind of salad, looks delicious!
Great combination of ingredients – I love it! 🙂
I am SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO… obsessed. with. Greek. salad. OMG. And mostly … because of the feta. (and black olives.) This is my FAVORITE way to enjoy that homemade feta… I realllllyy want some now!
I am too now!! I think im going to make feta once a month now so we have it on hand so I can make one of these babies whenever we want!
This looks delicious. Stunning photography. Emma.
Aw, thank you, Emma! 😀
I enjoy salads a lot, especially if any of the ingredients are homemade or homegrown – looks like a keeper 🙂
I agree! I’ll definitely be making this again with some home grown tomatoes this summer! And maybe I’ll have to throw in some cucumbers too 😉
I loved your spin on this “Greek-ish” salad. It looks delicious.
I love Greek salads! Adding the walnuts sounds good, too!
Thanks, Nancy!
Beautiful, love Greek salad and never added nuts. Great idea. Looks delicious.
Thanks! The nuts were a happy accident; I didn’t even miss the cucumbers 🙂
Looks lovely and fresh!
We were both thinking Greek this week!:) I love that you added nuts to your salad. That is one of my favorite salad ingredients, along with feta. I bet your salad was fantastic with the homemade feta – yum!
Ha! We were! Great minds think alike 😉
Oh I’m hungry now!