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This vegetable salad recipe is bursting with flavor! It tastes even better after it’s marinated: great for lunches, picnics and potlucks.

Vegetable Salad
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We’re always looking for recipes that make eating vegetables fun. Here’s one of our latest tricks for infusing veggies into our day to day: this chopped vegetable salad! These sturdy veggies make the best colorful mix, tossed with a red wine vinegar dressing and a sprinkle of feta cheese.

This burst of flavor tastes great right away: and even better after a few hours or days of marinating. Since it saves well, it’s ideal as a lunch salad or for picnics and potlucks!

Ingredients in this vegetable salad

This vegetable salad we designed to have all hearty veggies that will last for several days in the fridge. You’ll notice there’s nothing that would get brown or mushy, like tomatoes or avocados! It’s a straightforward mix of vegetables and the flavors have a Mediterranean flair. Of course, you can swap in vegetables of your choosing! Here’s what we use:

  • Red bell pepper
  • Red onion
  • English cucumber: an English cucumber has delicate skin and imperceptible seeds, so you don’t need to peel or seed it (do so if you swap in a standard cucumber).
  • Broccoli
  • Cauliflower
  • Green onion
  • Feta cheese
  • Olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, garlic powder and onion powder
Vegetable salad

Chop the vegetables into small pieces

The most important part about this vegetable salad? Chop the veggies very small, especially the broccoli and cauliflower florets! Sometimes it can be hard to digest large amounts of raw cauliflower and broccoli. We found when we chopped them very small here, they weren’t overwhelming to the salad.

The chopping portion of this salad takes quite a bit of time, even for someone with great knife skills. But it’s worth it once you’ve got it mixed up: we promise!

Customizing this vegetable salad

There are lots of other vegetables you can add to this vegetable salad to customize it to your tastes! The rule of thumb: use 7 to 8 cups chopped vegetables total. Here are a few ideas for other veggies to add:

  • Orange or yellow bell peppers
  • Carrots
  • Canned artichoke hearts
  • Olives
  • Tomatoes
  • Mushrooms
  • Spinach
  • Kale
  • Chickpeas
Vegetable salad

Storing leftovers

The great thing about this vegetable salad, in our opinion, is that it tastes even better after a few hours in the refrigerator. You can serve it immediately after serving, or store it up to 3 days refrigerated. (It likely lasts even longer, if you like!) This makes it great for lunches that last throughout the week.

If you’re serving very hungry eaters or want a large batch, we recommend making a double recipe. Click the 2x button on the recipe below. 

Ways to serve this marinated vegetable salad

This vegetable salad is pretty straightforward and basic, but it’s unlike any salad we make on the regular! For us, it’s a treat to have found a fun new way to eat colorful veggies. Here are a few ways we like to serve it:

  • As a side dish for weeknight meals: store it refrigerated
  • For lunches throughout the week as a way to add veggies
  • For picnics as a marinated vegetable salad
  • For potlucks: consider making a double recipe!

Dietary notes

This vegetable salad recipe is vegetarian and gluten-free. For vegan, plant-based and dairy-free, omit the feta cheese.

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Easy Vegetable Salad

Vegetable Salad
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5 from 2 reviews

This vegetable salad recipe is bursting with flavor! It tastes even better after it’s marinated: great for lunches, picnics and potlucks.

  • Author: Sonja Overhiser
  • Prep Time: 20 minutes
  • Cook Time: 0 minutes
  • Total Time: 20 minutes
  • Yield: 4 1x
  • Category: Side dish
  • Method: No cook
  • Cuisine: Vegetables
  • Diet: Vegan

Ingredients

Scale
  • 1 large red bell pepper (1 ½ cups small diced)*
  • 1/2 red onion (½ cup diced)
  • 1/2 English cucumber (1 cup diced**)
  • 2 heads broccoli (2 cups very small florets)
  • 1/2 head cauliflower (2 cups very small florets)
  • 2 green onions
  • ¼ cup feta cheese crumbles
  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon Dijon mustard
  • ¼ teaspoon each garlic powder and onion powder
  • ¾ teaspoon kosher salt
  • Fresh ground black pepper

Instructions

  1. Chop the vegetables as noted above and place them in a large bowl. (Make sure to keep the broccoli and cauliflower florets very small.)
  2. Toss with the olive oil, red wine vinegar, Dijon mustard, garlic powder, onion powder, salt, and pepper. Taste and add additional salt as desired. Enjoy immediately or refrigerate for up to 3 days.

Notes

*Or, customize this vegetable salad by using 7 to 8 cups of bite-size chopped vegetables of your choosing. If you’re serving very hungry eaters or want a large batch, make a double recipe: click the 2x button above. 

**If you use a standard cucumber, make sure to peel and seed it. English cucumber has a very thin, delicate skin that doesn’t need to be peeled and imperceptible seeds.

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About the authors

Alex & Sonja

Hi! We’re Alex & Sonja Overhiser, authors of the acclaimed cookbooks A Couple Cooks and Pretty Simple Cooking—and a real life couple who cooks together. We founded the A Couple Cooks website in 2010 to share seasonal recipes and the joy of home cooking. Now, we’ve got over 3,000 well-tested recipes, including Mediterranean diet, vegan, vegetarian, pescatarian, smoothies, cocktails, and more!

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5 Comments

  1. Kim says:

    Excellent recipe!! Made as written but used marinated red peppers and added chopped baby spinach as well. It is so delicious! That small bit of dressing perfectly coats everything and keeps it fresh to enjoy each day for lunch at the office. Thank you!






    1. Alex Overhiser says:

      Thank you for making it!

  2. Vicki says:

    I made this salad and couldn’t eat the dressing. The saltiness was overwhelming. I even made it again with no salt and couldn’t eat it. Are you sure these ingredients are correct?

    1. Alex Overhiser says:

      Are you using kosher salt? It would be very salty with table salt.

  3. Sonja Overhiser says:

    Let us know if you have any questions!