Easy and delicious cucumber salad with walnuts and a yogurt based dressing. Perfect and refreshing for warm days when you don’t feel like cooking but still want something healthy!
Cucumber salad with walnuts
This delicious and easy salad originally is from the website of Sonia, although I don’t think she’s very active anymore. But regardless, this cucumber salad recipe is the perfect quick salad for busy days or for when those times of the year where it is too hot to be in the kitchen.
Today is one of those days. The temperature is well above 30˚C (close to 90˚F) and I can’t be bothered to cook anything or turn on the stove. But this cucumber salad just requires a light chopping, a little bit of mixing and your done. Healthy dinner is made.
Yogurt dressing
The dressing for this cucumber salad is based on yogurt making it light and refreshing. I do sometimes add a tablespoon of mayonnaise through the dressing as I like the creaminess of mayo more than yogurt. But both are delicious. Due to the seasoning added to the dressing you can definitely do without the mayonnaise.
Want more protein?
Now this simple salad is quite light. Which is what I want on hot days. But if you want a bit more protein you can quickly add a bit of bulk by using some legumes. Chickpeas would be a good choice and if you use canned chickpeas, you just have to rinse them and add to the cucumber salad.
Let’s assume the weather is cooling down a bit you can also grill some chicken (this chicken yakitori is a great choice! Works on the barbecue too!) and add to the salad with cucumber or something like tuna would work really well too!
Cucumber salad with walnuts
Ingredients
- 1 medium cucumber
- 1/2 bulb fennel thinly sliced
- 30 gr walnuts coarsely chopped
- 100 gr lamb's lettuce
- sprouts to garness I used gardencress
Dressing
- 60 gr Greek yoghurt
- 1 tbsp za’atar
- juice of 1/2 lemon
- salt and pepper to taste
How to make the cucumber salad
- Peel the cucumber and cut it in half lengthways, then in half again and cut into slices of the thickness you want it to be.
- Slice the fennel leaves very finely. Making them too thick will make it too overpowering.
- Add cucumber, yogurt, half of the walnuts, za’atar, lemonjuice, fennel, salt and pepper to a medium mixing bowl and mix it all well.
- Put your green at the bottom of a plate and put the cucumber salad on top.
- Garnish with the rest of your walnuts and the cress.
Nutrition Information per portion:
Disclaimer:
The nutritional values above are calculated per portion. The details are based on standard nutritional tables and do not constitute a professional nutritional advice.
Loved this salad. I added a sliced gherkin, sliced red onion, fresh dill and cilantro. Used sour cream instead of greek yogurt as that’s what I had. I also sprinkled crumbled blue cheese on top. (I think feta would also be good.) Thank you for a wonderful way to prepare cucumber. Will be using this recipe a lot!
Ah thanks so much Jillian! Glad to hear you liked the salad. And I agree; adding feta is always a good idea (or that crumbled blue cheese sounds wonderful too!)