This Greek Cucumber Salad With Chickpeas is an easy recipe to make any time you crave a healthy and delicious salad. Packed with Mediterranean flavors, this salad is perfect for summer picnics, parties, or just as a side dish with your favorite dishes.
This recipe is part of my growing collection of salads you can find on the website, like this Roasted Beet And Arugula Salad, Bacon Potato Salad, or Sweet Potato Salad.
Easy chickpeas cucumber salad that doesn’t require any cooking
Who doesn’t love an easy salad that you can put together in no time? This Greek cucumber salad with chickpeas is what you need to bring to any party, potluck, or picnic. Or maybe you just want an easy salad any day of the week when you grill burgers, steaks, or pork chops.
We love it with grilled or pan-fried pork chops. Sometimes, we just cook some sausages in the air fryer and throw them next to the salad. You can add this salad to a bed of greens, but this is not really traditional for a Greek salad.
Greek salads are easy and simple. They use basic fresh vegetables, like tomatoes, onions, cucumbers or peppers, black olives, fresh lemon juice, and good quality olive oils. Yum!
Ingredients Needed
- Fresh vegetables and herbs: This salad has cucumbers, tomatoes, parsley, and optional fresh mint. If you want to make this salad in the winter, you can also use dried herbs. They are perfectly acceptable to flavor the salad.
- Canned chickpeas: I am all for cooking from scratch, but there are some ingredients that I like using in cans. Beans, chickpeas, and lentils are some of the best ingredients you need to have in your pantry. Beans take time to cook, and a can of already-cooked beans is a great option for a quick meal. They can really save the day if you are out of ideas and don’t know what to make for dinner.
- Dressing: This salad dressing is very simple but full of flavor. We often use all kinds of salad dressings from the store, not realizing how easy it is to make your own. Mediterranean salads are made with simple ingredients, and the dressing is also simple. Good olive oil, lemon juice, a little bit of garlic, salt, and pepper are all you need to dress a simple salad.
How to make this salad
Step 1. Any salad starts with the vegetables that will need to be cleaned. Peel the cucumbers and chop them. Also, chop the tomatoes, olives, and herbs. Place all of them in a salad bowl.
Step 2. Make the dressing. Whisk olive oil, lemon juice, minced garlic, and sugar, and add salt and pepper to your taste. Drizzle the dressing over the salad and mix to coat all ingredients.
How to serve it
You could tear pieces of pita bread over the salad and serve it with pita pockets filled with falafel or leftover lamb. Alternatively, you can serve the salad as it is next to your favorite grilled meats, like burgers, chicken, or steaks. Serve it as an appetizer next to these delicious ham and cheese pinwheels.
The salad is best when consumed right away, but if you need to take it to a picnic or a party, add the dressing only before serving. Leftovers should be kept in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 2 days.
More recipes to love
Greek Cucumber Salad With Chickpeas
Ingredients
- 1 cup cucumber peeled and diced about 1 medium-size English cucumber
- 4 Roma tomatoes chopped or other tomatoes your like
- 1 can chickpeas 16ounces, drained&rinsed
- ¼ cup Kalamata olives chopped
- 1 bunch coarsely chopped parsley about 1/4 cup
- Optional: 2 tablespoons fresh mint chopped
- Optional toss in: Torn pieces of pita bread or crumbled Feta cheese
Whisk together:
- Juice from 1 lemon
- 2-3 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 teaspoon minced garlic about 2 garlic cloves
- 1 teaspoon sugar
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon ground black pepper
Instructions
- Wash, peel and chop the cucumber. Place it in a medium salad bowl.
- Chop the tomatoes and add them to the bowl.
- Open a can of chickpeas, drain and rinse the chickpeas. Add them to the bowl.
- Remove the stones from the olives, chop and add them to the bowl.
- Chop the parsley and fresh mint and add them as well.
- Optional, toss pieces of pita bread and throw them in the bowl. You can add Feta cheese, if you like it.
- Separately, whisk together lemon juice, olive oil, minced garlic, sugar, salt and pepper to taste.
- Drizzle the dressing over the salad and mix gently to coat all ingredients.
Notes
- The can of chickpeas can be replaced with a can of beans.
- Serve this salad with pita bread, falafel, leftover lamb or other grilled meats.
- Pita bread and the fresh mint are optional.
Cristina
Monday 27th of May 2024
I've been looking for this recipe ever since I had this salad at a Greek restaurant. It was very easy to make and I love the dressing, will use it in other salads as well. The mint leaves added a unique, subtle flavor. Excellent recipe, thank you Gabriela!
Lorelei
Monday 27th of May 2024
This is a very easy and great salad recipe for summer. I bet it is great for a picnic, but I would make it for dinner or lunch too, next to some protein.