5 Easy Summer Salads for Lunch and Dinner

No meal’s more refreshing than a summer salad on a hot day. With crisp veggies, pops of sweet fruit, crunchy garnishes, filling proteins and a flavourful dressing to balance it all out, how could you possibly go wrong?

Why we love summer salads

Salads are not only delicious but they’re also loaded with nutritious ingredients that are great for your body. Plus, they’re easy to throw together, needing significantly less cooking than most other meals. All these things make them the perfect meal for both lunch and dinner – not just as a side dish!

HelloFresh tip: You can add extra servings of our Summer Salads recipes to your boxes so you have leftovers to take for lunch the next day.

How to pack summer salads for lunch

Nobody wants to eat a soggy salad for lunch! Sadly, this is one of the biggest barriers to packing a vibrant salad for work. How you store your salad could be the difference between bringing in a nutritious and delicious lunch or overspending on takeaway instead. 

Sometimes avoiding the sog is as simple as storing your dressing pre-portioned in a separate container and adding it to the rest of your salad when it’s time to eat. But, if you want to prevent your other ingredients from sogging up your salad, you’ll have to take it a step further:

• Specialty containers: The best kind of salad container is one with lots of compartments. This allows you to separate your salad leaves not just from your dressings but also from your wetter ingredients, like tomatoes and cucumbers. Plus, you can keep your proteins separate and heat them up without ruining the fresh elements of your salad.

• Stacking: If you don’t have a salad container with many compartments, layering your ingredients is the way to go. First, put your dressing in (or put it in a separate container), then layer in your salad ingredients from sturdiest and wettest (least likely to wilt, e.g. grilled chicken or chopped tomatoes) to flimsiest and driest (most likely to wilt, e.g. baby spinach leaves). This keeps your wettest ingredients away from your wilt-prone ingredients, ensuring everything remains fresh until it’s time to tip it all out into a bowl and eat.

5 easy Summer Salads for lunch and dinner

Lemon Pepper Prawns with Roast Veggie Toss & Dill-Parsley Mayo

Zingy Lemon Pepper Prawns meet creamy Dill Parsley Mayo in this easy-peasy Summer Salad. You can pull this warm, hearty dish together in just four simple steps – chop, bake, fry and serve! It’s all topped off with flaked almonds for extra crunch that elevates this salad from delicious to unbelievably delicious.

Seared Haloumi & Garlic Crouton Salad with Caesar Dressing & Sesame Seeds

This Summer Salad tastes as delicious as it looks. In it, you’ll find shards of cool cucumber, gems of bright tomatoes and of course, fresh green mixed salad leaves. But that’s just the start! It’s all tossed together with irresistible Seared Haloumi, Garlic Croutons and Caesar Salad Dressing for flavour that packs a major punch.

Seared Beef Rump & Garlic Butter with Roast Veggie Toss & Creamy Pesto

Sensational. Delightful. Scrumptious. This is a Summer Salad that’s worthy of every buzzword there is. With each bite, you’ll fall head over heels for spiced roast veggies and tender Beef Rump smeared with garlic butter. The best part, though? It’s got to be the Creamy Pesto dressing that pulls it all together.

Easy Panzanella-Style Red Pesto Chicken Salad with Garlic Aioli

We’ve got two words for you: Italian. Vibes. That’s what this delicious Panzanella-style Summer Salad brings to the table. With seared chicken slathered in red pesto, fresh, vibrant veggies, as well as garlicky, herby croutons in the mix, it’s impossible to pick a favourite ingredient!

Soy & Ginger Sesame Salmon with Roast Veggie Salad

Take crispy-skinned salmon to the next level with an irresistible mix of salty, sweet and umami soy, zingy ginger and nutty sesame seeds. Team it up with a hearty roast veggie Summer Salad and garlic aioli, and you’ve got magic on a plate.

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