15+ Delicious Holiday Salad Recipes
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These holiday salad recipes are absolutely essential during the festive season. They’re fresh, flavorful, incredibly delicious, and they look gorgeous, too!
Published on Dec 2019 /Updated on Dec 2024
With the holiday season just around the corner, I had to reshare this amazing roundup of festive salads I published about 5 years ago. Some of these recipes are staples in my household, especially this time of year.
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These stunning holiday salads are terrific for adding healthy, fresh, and wholesome ingredients to your Christmas menu. They’re bursting with colours, nutrients, fantastic flavours, and textures.
Plus, they require minimal prep. Most can be made ahead of time and combined with the dressing just before serving.
You can choose from healthy and inexpensive ingredients like crunchy cabbage, celery, apples, sweet potatoes, crunchy nuts, and savory cheese crumbles. Next, garnish with vibrant pomegranate seeds and cranberries, which make everything festive and glamorous.
Everyone will love these mouth-watering holiday salads. You’ll be able to feed a crowd in no time, and your Christmas table will look amazing.
Saving you time, stress, and money.
Happy holidays! xx
Holiday Salad Recipes
Easy Beetroot Salad
This vibrant beetroot salad is a standout, tossed in a rich yogurt mustard dressing and topped with crunchy almonds. It’s quick to prepare, making it a healthy and flavorful addition to your holiday tablel in just minutes!
Celery Salad
Crisp and refreshing celery combined with juicy pears and parmesan cheese makes a delightful combination of sweet and savoury flavours. Garnish with pomegranate arils, and you'll have a gorgeous and delicious festive salad.
Quick Italian Artichoke Salad
This quick artichoke salad turns a jar of grilled artichokes into a fabulous starter or side dish that is perfect all year round. It’s delicious, so simple to throw together, and full of Mediterranean flavor.
Beet and feta salad
This is another flavorful salad featuring juicy beets, feta cheese, arugula, and crunchy walnuts. It's perfect for any festive gathering, and as always, it's easy to prepare and looks stunning!
Arugula Apple Salad
Fresh, vibrant, and bursting with delicious, fresh apples and peppery arugula, this salad is the perfect light side dish to wow your guests. It’s sophisticated enough for any special occasion, including Christmas!
Arugula Pear Salad
This arugula pear salad features fresh leaves and a delightful mix of juicy pears, blue cheese, and walnuts. It’s simple to prepare, takes little time, and tastes fresh and fabulous.
Pomegranate & Pear Green Salad
This gorgeous green salad recipe is bursting with fresh pomegranate, Bartlett pear, and honeycrisp apple, and it will brighten up your holiday table. It looks amazing!
Salad with grapes
This easy salad with juicy grapes also combines lettuce, blue cheese, walnuts, and a light vinaigrette dressing. It's a fantastic side salad or stylish starter, perfect for the holiday season. Best of all, it can be prepared in just 10 minutes.
Winter Rainbow Quinoa Salad
This colourful, delicious salad is packed with bright green spinach, crispy apples, juicy pomegranate bursts, pistachio pieces, goat cheese, and a hint of pickled beets. It looks and tastes fantastic!
Winter Salad
This delightful winter salad turns inexpensive root vegetables into a hearty and delicious seasonal dish. It's a filling, veggie-packed meal perfect for both holidays and weeknights!
Cabbage Apple Salad
This easy cabbage and apple salad is a must in my household. The recipe combines crispy apples, finely sliced cabbage, walnuts, and savoury parmesan. It's flavorful, fresh, and crunchy, and it's guaranteed to please everyone.
Beetroot Orange Salad
In this vibrant beetroot and orange salad, we use sweet oranges, vacuum-packed roasted beets, crunchy walnuts, and a light citrus cumin dressing. It's a healthy, delicious, and refreshing holiday side dish.
Citrus Cabbage Salad
Fresh, vibrant, and deliciously crunchy, this napa cabbage salad is a great side dish for dinner. It’s terrific as part of a holiday spread!
Arugula Fig Salad with Creamy Balsamic Vinaigrette
This refreshing arugula fig salad features fresh figs, crunchy pistachios, peppery arugula, and a creamy balsamic vinaigrette. And I think fresh figs can also be quite glamorous and perfect for a special occasion.
Green Salad with Apples, Cranberries and Pepitas
This fresh green salad recipe features sliced apples, toasted pepitas, dried cranberries, and crumbled goat cheese. It looks so yummy and festive that I'm sure everyone will love it.
If you loved these holiday salad recipes…
You might want to check out more collections of recipes that are absolutely perfect for the holidays and special occasions.
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- 40 + Italian appetizers
- 25 Dairy-free appetizers
- 40+ Party food ideas
- 20+ Dip sauces
- 40 Vegetarian appetizers
Whether you plan an epic holiday gathering, potlucks, or any other special reunion, I hope one of these delicious holiday salad recipes will be on your menu! : )
Please let me know in the comments if you have any questions; I would love to hear from you.
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15+ Amazing Holiday Salad Recipes
Ingredients
- 8 long celery stalks, thinly sliced
- 1 pear or apple, thinly sliced
- ¼-½ pomegranate, arils (optional)
- ⅓ cup shaved Parmesan
Dressing
- 2 tablespoon extra virgin olive oil, plus more fro drizzling if you wish
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1 teaspoon honey
- ¼ heaped teaspoon fine salt, plus more to taste
- ⅛ teaspoon black pepper, plus more to taste
Instructions
- Separate the celery ribs, trim the stalks, and keep the most tender celery leaves. Wash and pat them dry, then finely chop the leaves and slice the celery ribs into 1/4-inch-thick pieces. Add everything to a large salad bowl.
- Wash and cut the pear or apple into two halves, remove the core, and slice each half into 1/4-inch-thick pieces. Add to the salad bowl.
- If you don't use store-bought shaved parmesan cheese, you can do it yourself by finely slicing it with a peeler or a serrated knife. Add half of it to the salad bowl and keep the rest to garnish the salad before serving.
- Remove the arils from half a pomegranate. To reduce the mess, I suggest you remove the arils while keeping the pomegranate submerged in a bowl full of water. Pat dry the arils and set aside.
- Place the dressing ingredients into a jar with a lid (I start with 1/4 heaped tsp of salt) and shake well until emulsified. Pour the dressing over the salad and toss gently. Taste and adjust the seasoning to your taste.
- Top with the pomegranate arils and the reserved shaved parmesan cheese. The quantity of arils depends on the size of the serving plate or bowl (trust your judgment).
- Serve the celery salad straight away at room temperature.
