Mediterranean Salad
Beyond Healthy-ish: Mediterranean Salad
I usually think of myself as a healthy-ish eater. We don’t eat out often, don’t eat fast food, and don’t eat prepared foods. We eat multiple fruits and vegetables over the course of the day. Sounds pretty good, right? That’s what I thought until I read some news article this week about the diets of people living in the world’s “blue zones.” These are places where a large number of people live healthily to beyond 100. I took a good look at our diet and, well, that’s how we ended up with this Mediterranean salad with lemon poppy seed dressing.
Could this be the key to good health?
According to the article, the people living in these blue zones have extraordinarily healthy diets (not healthy-ish). The Mediterranean diet was one of those discussed in the article. This diet is low meat and dairy consumption, and high in fruits, vegetables, and legumes. While I don’t particularly have any aspirations to live over 100, I would like us to maintain our good health. While I won’t be giving up the no churn ice cream any time soon, I am trying to create some recipes that mimic these very healthy diets.
Mediterranean Salad = All the Veggies
This Mediterranean salad basically has everything I associate with that part of the world. I included cucumbers, cherry tomatoes, bell pepper, red onion, and olives. Chick peas served as my legume base. I didn’t want to go too crazy right away, so I also added tuna and feta cheese. You can omit the tuna and/or feta for vegetarian and vegan meals.
A Mediterranean Dressing for a Mediterranean Salad
The combination of veggies was really very good, but you can’t have a salad without a dressing. I thought about what kind of flavors would go well with my salad and figured lemon and olive oil have the Mediterranean vibe. Lemon, honey mustard (I used store bought), and poppy seeds get mixed into the olive oil base. The combination really enhances the flavors of the veggies and generally brightens up the whole salad.
Honestly, this salad is easy, fresh, and delicious. It also fills me full of virtue thinking I’m doing the right thing. Ha ha. I’m not sure I will be able to keep up a super plant-rich diet, but this seems like a decent start.
I did manage to forget to photograph most of this process – again – but I have a good IG reel you can watch. Check it out on @eileen_goodenoughkitchen
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Mediterranean Salad
Ingredients
Mediterranean Salad
- 1 15.5 oz can chickpeas
- 1 cucumber
- 1 bell pepper any color
- 1 cup cherry tomatoes
- 1/2 cup sliced black olives
- 1/2 medium red onion
- 1 12 oz can tuna in water optional
- 1/2 cup crumbled feta cheese optional
Lemon Poppyseed Dressing
- 1/2 cup olive oil
- juice of 1/2 lemon
- 1 tbsp honey mustard store-bought is fine
- 1 tsp poppy seeds
Instructions
- Drain and rinse the chickpeas. Pour them into a large salad bowl.
- Peel and chop the cucumber. Add it to the chick peas.
- Wash the tomatoes and cut them in half. Add them to the salad bowl.
- Wash and chop the bell pepper and add it to the salad. I used yellow to have a nice contrast of color.
- Drain the sliced olives and them to the salad.
- Chop one half of the red onion and add it to the salad.
- Drain the tuna and add it to the salad, breaking it into pieces with a fork. The tuna is optional, of course, in the event you want a vegetarian/vegan meal.
- Sprinkle the feta over the salad. Again, this is optional if you are going for the vegan version.
- Toss the salad thoroughly.
Lemon Poppyseed Dressing
- Add 1/2 cup of olive oil to a measuring cup.
- Add the juice of 1/2 a lemon, 1 tbsp of prepared honey mustard, and 1 tsp of poppy seeds directly into the olive oil in the measuring cup. Mix until thoroughly combined.
- Pour the dressing over the salad and toss thoroughly. The dressing should lightly coat all of the salad ingredients.
