This is an easy, healthy and quick chickpea salad that’s customizable and serves brilliantly as a side or main dish. What are chickpeas? Chickpeas are part of the pea family and classified as legumes. They actually come from a plant, (according to the Cleveland Clinic), are considered as a superfood because they are so nutritious and researchers believe they originated in Egypt. That's our history lesson on chickpeas for today friends 🙂
We all love summer recipes that are loaded with fresh crunchy veggies but as we head into colder months right now this chickpea salad is hard to resist so we are not going to label it as a summer salad. Let's call it fresh, crunchy, nutritional and seasonal since you can add a variety of veggies to make it seasonal.
This is a recipe update that I am making since this was first published June 2021 and we were going into the colder months then. Now August 2022 we are leaving the cold months and clearly I can't wait to get into spring! This crunchy chickpeas salad is hopefully going to help me call Spring, we are waiting for warmer days filled with sunshine - "she says as she types with frozen fingers and toes :)"
The seasons are beautiful though aren't they? In saying that we've enjoyed a host of wonderful warm and cozy soups to see us through those much needed comfort bowls. The one we really enjoyed the most were this tomato soup, you may not like tomato soup but let me tell you that it's an incredibly delicious soup especially served with crostini! Another popular one was this Vegetable Turmeric Soup. Now we onto lighter foods like this salad and for more salad recipes take a look at these. More salad recipes.
How To Make This Chickpea Salad
This is very versatile salad bowl with loads of crunch so let's see how we customize it;
It's not a matter of how but more a matter of when and the answer is all the time....
- Try it with different salad dressings
- Add feta cheese, bell peppers and Kalamata olives for a Greek Salad twist.
- Creamy avocado slices and leave out the oil in the dressing because you're getting your healthy fat in your avocados, that's if you are concerned about the calorie count.
As with all simple recipes that use a few ingredients, it's important to use the most fresh that you can find since that's all you have to pull in flavor. These ingredients you could probably get all in one store, my kind of shopping;
Ingredients
Chickpeas: - Love them! High in fiber and protein and they keep you full for longer. Rinse the chickpeas set aside to drain while you prep the other veggies. Feel free to peel them because sometimes it is a necessity depending on which ones you're using.
Roasted chickpeas if time permits although there's enough crunch in here.
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Cherry Tomatoes: Cherry tomatoes work best here because they don't have too much liquid which can make your salad soggy and that's a no no! If you use the larger ones, or Roma, try and buy them quite firm still.
Cucumber: Any cucumber and preferably leave the peels on they are such a gorgeous color! However, if you find the peel too waxy, your choices are to wash it properly or peel and discard. Just be cautious of where you're buying your produce, there's also chemicals to consider sadly.
Parsley: Parsley is wonderful in that it brightens up the salad, adds a bit of savory especially with the lemon juice.
Lemon juice: Awakens the entire salad.
Red onion: Give them a soak in a bowl of cold or ice water to alleviate the sharpness.
Bell peppers - Packed with vitamins and low in calories, what's not to love! Besides they are so colorful and if you follow me on Instagram you will know that colorful food is what I do plus the crunchiness in the peppers adds it's own textured salad dimensions.
What I normally do is make this chickpea salad as a base and then go from there depending on what we serving it with. Most times if there's a large amount of salad we use it as a chickpea salad and the other half turn it into a Greek inspired dish.
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Suggestions and Tips
With simple salads such as these there are very seldom tips but I will say this;
- If you are using canned chickpeas because they're so convenient, do check the label for the sodium. Cooking fresh chickpeas or using canned ones with a lower sodium content can limit the salt in your meal.
- Personally I love the way they stabilize blood sugar levels as that's something that I struggle with.
More Salad Recipes
If you love this recipe then you must take a look at my summer recipes! and of course the recipe that inspired this one, my Mediterranean Salad.
Chickpea Salad
Ingredients
- 2 cans chickpeas drained 400 grams
- 1 small red onion sliced
- 1 ½ cups cherry tomatoes
- ¾ cup fresh parsley roughly chopped
- 1 fresh lemon
- ½ cucumber cubed/cut into bite size pieces
- season with Smell & Taste salt and pepper to taste
- ½ cup roasted peppers optional add on See notes below
Salad Dressing
- 4 Tbsps extra virgin olive oil
- 1 lemon juiced
- 1 garlic clove minced
- ½ teaspoon sea salt and fresh black pepper
Instructions
Salad Dressing
- Add the salad dressing ingredients into a jar or measuring jug, shake or whisk them together. Set aside and make the salad.
Salad
- Using a colander/sift rinse and drain the chickpeas and allow to drip.
- Start by adding the chickpeas into a large salad bowl (leaving just a few for the top). Pour part of the salad dressing over the chickpeas, give it a gentle mix. Add the remaining the salad ingredients, the salad dressing and enjoy!
- Add seasoning salt and pepper to taste if needed.
Notes
- Avocado, sliced or cubed
- Feta cheese
- Olives
- Celery
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