This healthy vegetarian quinoa salad makes for a simple lunch or dinner, thanks to staples like roasted red bell peppers, kalamata olives and feta from your fridge and pantry.
I get that feeling. I look at my watch. Scratch that, I look at the clock on my iPhone—after annoyingly plugging in my 4 number password twice because I have bubblethumbs—and realize, CRAP! It’s lunch!
Now what?
If I’m not going out to lunch with my husband (we’re pretty good at day-dating) you’ll find me in the kitchen adding odds and ends from the pantry and fridge for a cobbled together salad of leftovers, canned beans and anything with a pucker.
Where this salad may have started off without much of a thought in serving up me, myself and I for a one-on-one lunch, it proved its worth in spades when I pulled it out of my recipe hat and made it for a lunch to serve 16 food bloggers.
It’s a good one for that.
All year long I’ve been creating and sharing recipes featuring DeLallo Foods and their plentitude of pastas, pestos, oils and vinegars. Happily, DeLallo was a sponsor again this year at Better Blog Retreat, which is where I pulled this salad out of my arsenal of recipes I know by heart to serve for one of our food blogger lunches.
Oh nothing. No pressure. Just making lunch for some of my favorite, most talented food bloggers who have millions of followers and create amazing recipes who are now going to eat something little old me is making.
But I had nothing to worry about. Cooking with ingredients from DeLallo never disappoints.
About the Recipe
Having a stash of DeLallo’s Salad Savors in my fridge is touched with a bit of irony. Why? Because these packaged salad fixins’ should be named Salad Savers (ers instead of ors) because they save/rescue me in my meal time prep so much of the time. The gourmet salad ingredients are variously themed with ingredients that include vegetables, nuts and cheese and are all appropriately pre-portioned.
It makes things so easy.
I was going for a vegetarian salad and knew the ingredients from the Zesty Salad Savors would fit in perfectly with our easy, snackable menu. Roasted red bell peppers, already chopped. Briny kalamata olives that are already pitted. And feta cheese that should never be forgotten. They created my med-inspired base.
To that I added canned garbanzo beans and cooked quinoa for extra protein. When cooking my quinoa I like to add about 1/2 teaspoon of kosher salt to the water to flavor the grain as it cooks. Be sure to bring your water to a boil before adding the salt so it doesn’t pit and ruin the bottom of your pan.
Arugula leaves and fresh basil leaves add the leafy green element I always crave.
And the simple garlicky dressing is just that. Simple. Be sure not to leave out the dried thyme. It rounds out the earthiness of the dressing. Crumble the thyme leaves between your fingers to release the oils and mellow the herb.
If You Liked This Recipe, You’ll Like These:
- Favorite Quinoa Salad
- Thai Quinoa Salad
- Moroccan Chickpea Quinoa Power Salad
- Quinoa and Kale Protein Power Salad
- Southwest Quinoa and Grilled Corn Salad
If you make this recipe, please let me know! Leave a comment below or take a photo and tag me on Instagram with #foodiecrusheats.
- 1½ cup dry quinoa
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- ½ cup extra virgin olive oil
- 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
- 2 garlic cloves, pressed
- ½ teaspoon dry basil, minced
- ½ teaspoon dried thyme, crushed between your fingers
- kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper
- 3 cups arugula
- 1 15 ounce can garbanzo beans, drained
- 1 package DeLallo Zesty Salad Savors
- or
- ⅓ cup roasted red bell pepper, drained and chopped
- ⅓ cup pitted kalamata olives, sliced
- ⅓ cup crumbled feta cheese
- ¼ cup basil, thinly slivered
- Cook the quinoa according to package directions with ½ teaspoon salt added to the water. Cool completely.
- Mix the olive oil, balsamic vinegar, pressed garlic, basil and thyme. Whisk until well combined. Season with kosher salt and freshly ground black pepper and set aside.
- To a large serving bowl, add the quinoa, arugula, garbanzo beans, contents of the Salad Savors package—red bell pepper, kalamata olives and feta cheese.
- Drizzle with the dressing and garnish with basil. Season to taste. Serve at room temperature.
Thanks for stopping by. Cheers to getting into the kitchen and making something good.
This post is in partnership with DeLallo Foods. As always, thank you for reading and for supporting companies I partner with, which allows me to create more unique content and recipes for you. All opinions are always my own.
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Honestly, after all the Christmas cookies, I feel like the “green element” like you said is crucial!! Not to mention the whole healthy quinoa thing going on here, because they’re aren’t enough Billy Blanks Tae Bo DVD’s in the world that’s gonna burn off the Pinterest calories. I have not heard of DeLallo but will be asking my grocery store if they carry their products, if not, I’ve read that you can ask the manager to order some and see how it goes! And I love your wood board, it’s a little like the one going on for my artisan cutting board giveaway I’m hosting right now! Thanks.
I find that olive oil at Kroger with the pastas. It’s good flavor at a great price
Salads like this are perfect for dinner AND lunch! So much healthy goodness in one bowl. Yum!
Love everything about this salad! From garbanzo beans, arugula to the dressing. So good!
I remember this salad well… it is everything I love in a giant bowl!!! Minus you. 🙂 xoxox Miss you!
How GENIUS is to use that Salad Savors as a topping on this gorgeous Quinoa Salad! I love DeLallo and ANYTHING quinoa, so this is totally my jam! Pinned!
Salads like this are a must especially during the holidays to offset all the not-so-healthy goodies that are eaten.
This salad is perfect for now and later…love the Mediterranean flavors!
I could easily see myself eating this salad daily. Love the combination of Mediterranean ingredients.
This salad is so pretty! But, more importantly, it sounds absolutely delicious. Love love love Mediterranean flavors.
Yum. I used spinach instead of argula, and used about 1/2 the oil. Light and delicious!
I am totally in need of a big healthy salad like this right now!
Kari
http://www.sweetteasweetie.com
the colors of this salad are incredible and I adore the flavors! always good to have an arsenal ready to go for feeding a lot of people — adding this recipe to mine for sure
Yum! This salad is so colorful and looks delicious! I’m anxious to try out this new recipe. Thanks for sharing!
OMG, everything which I love in one bowl! Even my son, who is a grad of the “CIA” gave this salad a is thumbs up.
Angelina, that is awesome. Thanks to your son for his vote and to you for coming back around and letting me know!
How would I reduce this for 1 serving?
This salad was fantastic! Perfect side dish to simple grilled chicken the other night. Yum!
I can do without the Arugula, it and Radicchio are too bitter for my palate.
Everyday i eat salad .
Was excellent made it for Saturday Lunch used baby lettuce in purple and green was great combination and added a few cherry tomatoes.
Love that idea Sandy!
What is the calorie counter on this lovely dish?
Hi Heather, I don’t provide nutritionals on my recipes but if you want, you can input it into an app like My Fitness Pal.
This sounds amazing. Can this be prepared a day before or is it best to assemble the day of, since it has arugula in it?
I made a big batch for a holiday picnic, and am trying saving half for tomorrow without the dressing. I will pour the dressing over it right before serving. I saved another little bit with dressing, to see if it could last a day. It tastes awesome right now!
Wonderful dish made for dinner this evening. instead of vinegar I used fresh lemon juice with a little green onion and tomatoes. It was so good thank you so much! My husband loved it!
It is so hot right now and this sounds delicious, light and filling! Looking for are to this tonight. Thanks for th inspiration!
Where did you find those measuring spoons?? I was looking for a recipe with arugula and found your website!
Made this last night when we had guests over. Everyone loved it, the arugula is perfect in this. Thank you!
Didn’t have arugula, used spinach. Perfection! Loved it!
So glad you made the switch De, and used what you had 🙂
How many calories per serving does it have?
Thank you for sharing this excellent recipe with quinoa. The ingredients listed above are of high-quality as well. Can’t wait to try it.
This was a winner! I’ll be making it again soon. Thank you!!
Hi I was looking at this recipe and noticed in the picture of the dressing ingredients what looks to be Dijon mustard, but it is not listed in the recipe ingredients? I always use Dijon in my balsamic dressing, so I am curious
This salad was a big hit. I used Israeli couscous (pearl). Delicious!
I wish when a good recipe like this is posted you would also post nutritional values as well!
This is a perfect recipe. I love the taste of the feta cheese sneaking up with a burst of “gotcha” flavor.
Looks so yummy and healthy! I think you forgot to add a drizzle of lemon juice to this dish though 🙂
My only complaint about quinoa at the moment is that it is quite pricey compared to rice and other grains.