6 Tasty and Easy-to-Make Salad Recipes

Salads are a very practical resource in the kitchen and also help us to purify. Here are very easy salad recipes that are ideal for lightening your body.

At certain times of the year, our body enters a natural purifying phase. Late summer and autumn are one example. Also, spring, in which the body no longer needs to retain as much energy and nutrients as in winter.

Salads are very suitable for promoting these elimination processes thanks to fresh and raw plant foods, rich in fiber, vitamins and antioxidant compounds. For this reason, they are ideal in periods when we want to enhance purification and not overload the body with heavy dishes. They allow us to make the most of the vitalizing properties of fresh vegetables of each season, with all their nutrients, fiber and antioxidants.

In these salad recipes you will find mostly green leaves and ingredients from the late summer and autumn months, such as grapes, citrus fruits, cabbage or beetroot. In general, to make easy, tasty, and more cleansing salads, follow these tips:

• Combine ingredients. Add healthy fats that strengthen cell membranes: olive, coconut and hemp oils from first cold pressing, avocados, seeds… In addition, they protect against free radicals thanks to their vitamin E.
• Play with colors. It includes intensely red, orange, and yellow foods because they are rich in carotenoids that reduce the risk of degenerative and chronic diseases. If you start eating a salad like this every day, your skin will remain hydrated and resist the action of the sun for months to come.

RED FRUIT SALAD WITH SWEET ORANGE DRESSING

Ingredients for 2 peopleas

• 1 cup baby spinach
• 1 cup mixed mallow and basil leaves, beet sprouts and Swiss chard
• 5 strawberries
• 10 strawberries
• 6 cherry tomatoes
• Half an avocado
• 1 tablespoon peeled hemp seeds – half a lemon, its juice

For the dressing:

• 1 orange, juiced
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1 medjool date, pitted
• 1 pinch of black pepper, freshly ground
• 1 tablespoon poppy seeds

To decorate:

• Calendula petals
• Nasturtium flowers
• Pea flowers
• Cornflower Flowers

Preparation:

1. Mix the vinaigrette ingredients, minus the poppy seeds, in a blender and blend until smooth. Add the seeds at the end.
2. Cut the avocado into cubes of about 2 cm and add lemon juice so that they do not oxidize.
3. Cut the strawberries and cherry tomatoes into halves.
4. In a flat salad bowl, arrange all the mixed leaves. Add the fruits, avocado cubes, hemp seeds and sweet orange dressing to taste.
5. Garnish the salad with the whole flowers or their petals. Serve with the rest of the dressing in a small bowl.

CLEANSING GREEN SALAD WITH BEETROOT

Ingredients for 4 people: 

• 3 handfuls arugula (or any other leafy green)
• 1 large beetroot
• 4 celery logs
• 1 tablespoon sesame seeds
• 1 tablespoon dulse seaweed flakes

For the dressing:

• 1 avocado
• Half a teaspoon of spirulina
• 1 date, pitted
• 1 teaspoon maple syrup
• A touch of ginger (the root fresh or powdered)
• Water to taste – a pinch of salt

Preparation:

• Place a vegetable bed made from the prepared handfuls of arugulas in a bowl.
• Grate the beetroot and then finely cut the celery into slices.
• To make the sauce, blend all the ingredients in an individual blender and then add water until you get the desired texture.
• Once everything is ready, arrange the green leaves and the cut vegetables in the salad bowl, pour the dressing over the top and mix well. Sprinkle with the sesame seeds and dulse seaweed flakes on top and serve immediately.

CAULIFLOWER SALAD WITH PEANUTS

Ingredients for 2 people:

• 300g cauliflower, separated into florets
• 1 good bunch of lamb’s lettuce
• 10 cherry tomatoes
• 2 tablespoons peanut butter (no sugar added)
• 1 tablespoon flax seeds
• Half a cup of water

Preparation:

1. Before starting, heat the oven to 200°C.
2. Mix the peanut butter in half a cup of water and the flax seeds in a bowl until it forms a sauce without large lumps.
3. Put the cauliflower florets on a baking sheet and mix well with the previous sauce.
4. Place it in the oven at medium height, at 200°C and with top and bottom heat. It will take about 18 minutes for the cauliflower to be prepared, but you can check by looking to see if it’s golden brown.
5. Then put a bowl or plate with the lamb’s lettuce and cherry tomatoes cut into quarters. The tomatoes have to be taken out of the fridge a while before so that they have all their flavor.
6. Remove the cauliflower from the oven and let it rest for 5 minutes.
7. Then put it on top of the lamb’s lettuce and tomatoes and you can serve it.

Delicious variations: instead of peanut butter you can also make the salad with other creams such as hummus (chickpeas), babaganoush (aubergines) or lentil puree.

RED RICE SALAD WITH SPINACH AND ORANGES

This salad provides you with complete proteins thanks to the combination of a cereal such as rice, tofu legumes and almonds.

Ingredients for 4 people:

• 200 g long-grain red rice
• 150 g baby spinach
• 2 medium oranges
• 100 g marinated tofu
• 40 g chopped almonds
• Olive oil
• Sea salt

For the dressing:

• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
• Pepper with five berries
• Sea salt

Preparation:

1. Put the rice in plenty of cold water with a little salt and a drizzle of oil. When it boils, lower the heat and let it cook for about 40 minutes over medium heat. When cooked, drain and let cool.
2. Remove the fibrous stems from the spinach. Wash and drain them well, and dry them carefully with a cloth or paper towel.
3. Peel the oranges, completely removing the white skin, and cut them into eighths.
4. You can assemble the salad with the rice as a base and the orange and spinach on top, or make a bed of oranges and leaves with the rice on top. Drain the marinated tofu, shred it with your fingers, and spread it over the top. Sprinkle with the almonds.

ESCAROLE AND TANGERINE SALAD

Ingredients for 4 people:

• 500 g tangerines
• 200 g escarole
• 1 red onion
• 100 g mini spinach

For the dressing:

• 3 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 2 tbsp lime juice
• 1 <>/<> teaspoons rice syrup
• A few mustard seeds
• Sea salt
• Freshly ground white pepper

Preparation:

1. Wash the spinach under cold running water, remove the stems and pat dry with paper towels.
2. Separate the tangerine segments, and peel and cut the onion into rings or crescents.
3. Remove the tougher outer leaves of the endive, discard them, and wash and chop the rest.
4. Arrange the escarole on the bottom of the salad bowl and then add the spinach leaves and onion. Finally, place the tangerine segments decoratively.
5. To prepare the dressing, put all the ingredients in a bowl and shake them well with the help of a whisk. Pour it over the salad at the time of serving.

COCONUT AND GRAPE SALAD

Ingredients for 4 people:

• 250 g leafy greens (you can combine various types of lettuce and sprouts)
• 2 fresh tomatoes
• 1 cucumber
• 1 carrot
• 12 grapes, quartered and seeded
• 5 walnuts, peeled

For the sauce:

• 1 can of pure coconut milk, made from fresh, organic coconuts
• 8 sun-dried tomatoes, rehydrated or in oil
• A generous handful of fresh chives

Preparation:

1. Chop the selected green leaves, add the fresh tomatoes (skinned and seeded), cucumber and carrot, and add the grapes cut into quarters and seeded.
2. For the sauce, whisk the coconut milk with the sun-dried tomatoes and chives until you get a homogeneous sauce with a nice pink color.
3. Once you have the sauce, integrate it into the salad. Stir it so that it impregnates the rest of the ingredients well.
4. To finish, with the salad already on the plate, sprinkle the chopped walnuts on top.

Presentation:

Try to make the presentation different and offer the elegance it deserves. To do this, treat each ingredient with care. If you chop the greens well, you will get the salad to have less volume on the individual plates.

THAI SALAD WITH BANANA AND WALNUTS

Ingredients for 4 people

• 500 g potatoes
• 2 bananas
• 150 g peeled peanuts
• 1 medium cucumber
• medium small leek
• 1 red chilli pepper
• a few fresh corianders leaves and salt

For the sauce

• 60 ml peanut oil
• the juice of a small lime
• white pepper and salt

Preparation

1. Wash the potatoes and pour them unpeeled into a saucepan with cold water and salt. They are put over high heat and, when the water boils, it is lowered to cook them slowly for 30 to 45 minutes. When cooked, drain, let cool, peel and dice them.
2. The banana is peeled and cut into slices. The cucumber is cut into sticks and the chilli and leek are cut into thin julienne strips.
3. Carefully mix all the ingredients in a bowl, except for the coriander.
4. Put the oil, lime juice, salt and pepper in a glass jar with screws, close and shake well. Drizzle the salad with this dressing, divide it into four bowls and serve it immediately garnished with the coriander.