Greek Salad Recipe

This Greek Salad recipe is from two amazing Greek friends! This Greek Salad is full of the best bits (and that means no lettuce or filler). Just plump pitted Kalamata olives, sun ripened tomatoes, crisp cucumber, red onion and crumbled feta with a delicious and simple dressing. This is a pushy recipe Dear Reader and shows how this recipe came to be such a popular classic!

Greek Salad originated in the late '60s or early '70s in Plaka in Athens. Local caterers there cleverly circumvented government fixed prices on tomatoes, cucumbers and other vegetables by adding feta cheese to a salad made from these regulated ingredients, creating a new dish in the process! Traditionally Greek salad does not have lettuce in it and this is more a version outside of Greece and Cyprus.

Sometimes I just make a big bowl of this Greek Salad and we have it for lunch with some pita bread, other times I make a bowl of this to go with meat as a side dish. For years I didn't order it until I had it with Valentina one night and I remembered how good it was when done well. Valentina is an amazing Cypriot Greek home cook and I asked her for her recipe and I also asked another Greek friend Lil (who is a private chef that cooked for us at our house) for her tips and this Greek Salad is a combination of theirs!

Why This Greek Salad Is So Good!

1 - As Valentina and Lil said, there are no boring bits in this Greek salad (and I'm looking at you lettuce haha)! This salad has lots of feta and olives which are the powerhouses of flavour plus the sweetness of tomatoes and crispness of cucumber. The rest of the ingredients are there to enhance these ingredients.

2 - Greek salad requires simple to find ingredients: tomatoes, cucumber, red onion, olives, feta, red wine vinegar, olive oil, oregano and mint.

3 - Ingredient notes: try and use the best, ripe tomatoes you can find. Also use Lebanese cucumbers because the skins are thin and they don't need to be peeled. Also make sure that your olives are pitted for a better eating experience.

4 - All of the ingredients are cut into smaller than bite sized pieces so that it's easy to spear some tomato, cucumber and olive in one forkful. The feta is also finely crumbled so that it becomes part of the dressing as does the onion.

If you're looking for other similar salads I also love this grilled halloumi on salad, Frozen Tomato Burrata Salad or the the famous La Scala Chopped Salad!. And if you're wondering what to serve this zesty salad with I'd recommend this with the Lamb Kleftiko or Greek Lamb and Potatoes.

Dear Reader, we just got back from a holiday where we ate a lot of Greek salad! We were away for a month and during that time we got to visit Greece. I've wanted to visit Greece forever as I've always had Greek friends while growing up. Mr NQN joined me on the trip and while it was great having him there, we sometimes bicker and fight when we travel because we have different travelling styles. He often wants to run around and play Ingress (like Pokemon Go) while I want to wander around the shops and eat at cafes and restaurants. This would be when we would fight. He would either say that he was sick of eating and shopping and I would say that I was sick of walking in the sun and a fight would ensue.

Mr NQN and I now do a thing when this happens. Remember Plaka in Athens where Greek salad was invented? We came up with our new relationship travel idea of "plonking" while in Plaka, one of the most picturesque neighbourhoods of Athens.

It was 4:30pm and the last thing I had eaten was half a panini at 8:30am. "I need to be plonked," I said to Mr NQN. "Ok where?" he asked because I obviously want to choose the place. I found somewhere and sat down and had a delicious pomegranate juice and eggplant dip and bread. Mr NQN then went running around doing his Ingress and taking photos while I rested, rehydrated and refuelled. And then over an hour later he stopped by and picked me up. He had gotten the running around out of his system and I felt brand new again!

So tell me Dear Reader, do you have different travelling styles? What do you do about it?

Greek Salad

An Original Recipe by Lorraine Elliott

Preparation time: 10 minutes

Cooking time: 0 minutes

Serves: 4 as lunch with bread, 6 as a side dish

• 3 large tomatoes (around 450g/1lb)
• 350g/12ozs Lebanese cucumbers (around 2-3 depending on size)
• 100g/3.5oz red onion (around half a large one), peeled
• 150g/5ozs Greek feta cheese, crumbled
• 200g/7ozs Kalamata olives, pitted
• Handful of fresh mint leaves
• 4 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 3 tablespoons red wine vinegar
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• 1 garlic clove, peeled and minced

Step 1 - First cut the tomatoes up into smaller than bite sized pieces. I cut the tomato in half, then each half into 5 or 6 wedges and then each wedge in half and place in a large salad bowl. Then top and tail the cucumbers and cut in half horizontally. Cut the cucumber into smallish triangles and add to bowl. Very thinly slice the onion into half moons and place in bowl along with the crumbled feta and olives. Roughly chop the mint leaves and add these too. Toss the salad to distribute the ingredients.

Step 2 -To a small jar add the olive oil, red wine vinegar, oregano and minced garlic. Place the lid on tightly and shake to emulsify the dressing. Pour over the salad and toss again. The salad shouldn't need much salt (with the feta used) but you can add pepper if you want.