Israeli Salad recipe
Low in calories, very simple to make, and extremely tasty and nutritionally rich, the Israeli salad is a great addition to any food table.
Until recent years, I didn’t even know it is an “Israeli Salad”. For me it was just a “salad”, the salad that me and everybody else I know ate at home, at list once a day (which is, by the way, pretty similar to other salads eaten in Italy or Greece). But that’s probably because I live in Israel.
True, in most countries until 10-15 years ago, there’s no way you could find vegetables like lettuce, cucumber and tomato in the same greengrocery. Olive oil? Outside some Mediterranean places and maybe California or something, who knew what that was?
But the world is changing, and today everyone can enjoy this simple, delicious and nutritional salad – so do try it.
Ingredients
(for a nice medium serving dish)
3 large tomatoes
3 medium cucumber
6-8 large lettuce leafs
1 red pepper (sweet)
4-5 small radishes (optional)
1/2 small onion
1/2 squeezed lemon
3-5 spoonful olive oil
salt, pepper
Preparation
1. Cut the tomatoes and cucumber into small to medium pieces.
2. Chop and add the lettuce.
3. Fine chop and add the sweet red pepper, radishes and onion.
4. Add the salt and pepper, then the olive oil and finally the lemon juice.
Tips:
- All vegetables should be fresh and firm.
- Don’t use the larger cucumber – they tend to be watery and tasteless.
- The best thing to do is to make the salad and eat it right away. If your making it in advance, don’t add the salt until the actual serving.
- If you don’t like olive oil, use another vegetable oil – only make sure it’s a good one.
“True, in most countries until 10-15 years ago, there’s no way you could find vegetables like lettuce, cucumber and tomato in the same greengrocery.”
Now you are sarcastic, right?
Not at all. Most of the fruits and vegetables eaten in the UK, for example, are imported and 20 years ago were rare to non existent. In the US things were pretty much the same, outside California.
Your hummus recipes are great. We have been eating it here in Australia at least since the 1950’s.
Now also a question, can you make it with chickpea flour? Does the it have to be cooked?
But Shooky, Shooky, you’ve got to get out more.
Have you read cookbooks from early 20th century. Lettuce, tomato, cucumber are there. And in the gardening books too, even the ones used in the primary schools.
Chinese gardeners were famous for the quality and huge variety of the vegetables they grew here in Australia. They arrived early in the 1800’s, part of the Gold Rush. US experience is probably the same. And in the UK expats returning from o/s would be hoping to find foodstuffs they had enjoyed in their postings.
Didn’t tomatoes come to Europe from the Americas, Columbus and all that?
What is just so wonderful is the openess of people to new tastes and experiences all over the world, all through history!
I just wanted to point out that Israel is a 60 year old country his salad is without a doubt not from Israel. In fact its internationally known as Shepard Salad. Some of these other recipes do not belong to Israel as well . (i.e Humus, Tahina, Falafel all belong to Lebanon.) Just wanted to clear the air.
As much as I enjoy your site, I can’t for the life of me imagine from where you got your information regarding the availability of vegetables 10 – 15 years ago. I’ll be 57 this fall, grew up in Detroit, spent every childhood summer in the coal mining boonies of southwestern Pennsylvania, and have lived in NYC all of my adult life and have never, EVER been to a grocery–even a small one–in which lettuce, tomatoes, and cucumber weren’t simultaneously available under one roof. Granted, good (“good,” mind you) olive oil was much less easily found but altogether unavailable? No way–every supermarket carried it, and that’s discounting ethnic neighborhoods where a much better selection could be found.