Do you feel like salads are boring or force yourself eat them because you know they are good for you? Follow my tips to jazz up your salad bowl and you’ll find yourself craving them!
Eat more salads to support your gut microbiome, prevent disease and boost your energy.
Here are 6 ways to jazz up a salad that will have you looking forward to munching on all that wholesome goodness.
1. Add texture to your salad.
Crunchy or soft and chewy – salads should have a variety of textures to make them more interesting and fun to eat.
Crunchy: Toast up some pumpkin seeds or sunflower seed with sea salt and cumin. Or roast some chickpeas – super quick and easy. Either way, adding some crunch will really elevate your salad.
Soft and chewy: Toss in some leftover roasted cauliflower or sweet potato into that salad. Chop up some dates or dried organic apricots.
2. Mix up the base.
Salads get boring when you’re always using the same old spinach. Not to mention you’re missing out on nutrients by not eating a variety of leafy vegetables. Mix up leafy greens to enjoy a combination in your base.
Here are some ideas:
- Combine chopped romaine and radicchio for some crunch and colour, like the salad above!
- Combine finely chopped and massaged kale with shredded purple cabbage.
- Combine chopped radicchio with peppery arugula – a personal favourite in the McJordan home!
3. Don’t forget salt.
Salt brings out the flavour in food, and salads are no exception. The advice from years past has been to avoid salt because it’s bad for heart disease when the opposite is actually true. Table salt is not a healthy salt since it’s highly processed and only contains sodium. However, pink Himalayan salt or Celtic sea salt is bursting with numerous trace minerals that support a healthy body and mind.
4. Add sweetness.
Food should have all the tastes to be satisfying. While I’m not suggesting you sprinkle your salad with table sugar, I am suggesting to add a sweet taste to make it far more satisfying.
Some ideas: chopped dates or dried organic apricots, sliced peach like this Peach Arugula Salad pictured above , pear or apple, raisins, cranberries or pomegranate seeds.
5. Change up your salad dressings
Making a creamy and dreamy salad dressing without dairy is easier than you think. The best ingredients to always keep in hand for the dairy-free dressings are: hummus , avocado , tahini or cashews . All are excellent options when you want a creamy salad dressing without the dairy.
Salads can get really heavy and be gut unfriendly when they contain too much heavy cream or mayonnaise (blegh).
6. Always add protein.
The biggest mistake people make when trying to get healthy is thinking that they will just eat low calorie salads for the rest of their life – boooooring not to mention this is a terrible idea. Yes eat salads to increase your veggies and be healthy, but don’t stop there. Add a good quality protein to your salad to make it a complete meal and you make it more blood sugar balancing and satiating.
Think beyond a hard boiled egg – while it’s a great choice, don’t stop there. Grilled tempeh , steak or roast chicken , canned salmon or tuna , sardines (yes I’m serious), sprinkle nuts and seeds, hemp hearts, edamame or grilled halloumi (a fave in the McJordan home – see The Joyous Cookbook!), chickpeas or blackbeans.
I hope that gives you some ideas to take your salad from boring to brilliant!
Joy xo
