Spinach Salad with Creamy Strawberry Vinaigrette

It’s well-known that fresh strawberries play well in spinach salads. While it’d be easy enough to slice them and toss them alongside baby spinach leaves, putting fresh strawberries in the dressing helps guarantee that bright berry flavor in every bite, and turns the whole dish a gorgeous shade of rose.

Add sliced strawberries too, if you like, and call it a double strawberry salad. While you’re at it, feel free to add other ingredients as well. Grilled chicken will turn this salad from a side into a weekday main dish; diced avocado and chopped toasted almonds will add richness and crunch. Or make it as written and it will be simply wonderful.

Recipe Details: Spinach Salad with Creamy Strawberry Vinaigrette

From Catherine Newman

Active time: 10 minutes

Total time: 10 minutes

Makes: 4 servings

Total carbohydrates: 4 grams per serving

Recipe Notes

If you’re not using a high-speed blender and the dressing ends up too thick to pour, you can add a tablespoon of water and blitz it again.

If you don’t have fresh garlic on hand, you can substitute 1/4 teaspoon garlic powder.

To lower the fat, skip adding extra feta to the salad, and to lower the salt, reduce the salt amount in the vinaigrette

English cucumbers are the plastic-wrapped kind – I like to halve one and scoop the seeds out with a spoon before slicing, because I’m fancy like that.

Ingredients

For the dressing:

• 1/2 cup strawberries, either fresh or frozen, then thawed
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste
• 1 clove garlic, chopped
• 1 tablespoon crumbled feta cheese, plus more to taste
• 1 teaspoon lemon juice
• Balsamic vinegar, to taste (optional)

For the salad:

• 4 ounces (4 cups) baby spinach
• 1/2 English cucumber, peeled, halved lengthwise, seeds removed, and sliced
• 1/4 cup crumbled feta cheese

Instructions

1. Make the dressing: Put the strawberries, oil, salt, garlic, and feta in a blender and blend at high speed until smooth, stopping to scrape down the blender jar with a rubber spatula if all the ingredients fly up and stick to the sides. Taste the dressing on a piece of spinach. If it needs a little extra zing, add the lemon juice. If it needs a little extra sweetness, add the balsamic vinegar. If it needs a little extra salt, add more salt or more feta. Blend and taste again, adjusting as you need to until it is very good.
2. Assemble the salad: Arrange the spinach on a platter or put it in a bowl, then top with the cucumber, drizzle on the dressing, and sprinkle with feta. Bring it to the table all fancy like that, but then toss it before serving.

Photo credit: Catherine Newman