Marinated Vegetable Salad is a healthy, make-ahead salad recipe highlighting crunchy fresh vegetables. Quick, easy, and fresh!
“Excellent summer salad. This will get compliments at your next BBQ. Seriously.”
Marinated Vegetable Salad – let’s talk about it!
How I’m loving the lettuce-less-ness of it. How it’s not only bright, beautiful, and colorful, but crazy-healthy too. How it’s make-ahead! Yep, chop all your favorite vegetables before going to bed then toss with a simple homemade vinaigrette, refrigerate, and serve the next day.
How it’s sugar free. I love a good sweet and savory combo as much as the next gal, but when it comes to fresh vegetables? I gotta go savory. Many marinated vegetable salad recipes call for tossing the vegetables in a dressing that includes equal parts sugar and vinegar, but I just can’t get down with sweet cauliflower when I know how delicious it can be tossed in a tart and snappy dressing instead!
Watch How to Make It
Raw Vegetable Salad
Now, I’ve chosen to highlight my favorite raw vegetables in this Marinated Vegetable Salad including cherry tomatoes, cucumber, cauliflower, carrots, and bell pepper, but you could swap in any vegetables you happen to love and/or have growing in your garden.
Raw zucchini, summer squash, broccoli, sweet onion, celery, and/or corn would all make excellent additions to this easy, healthy dish.
Start by chopping up a big bowl o’ summer vegetables. Like I said, the variety is totally up to you as long as it adds up to roughly 10 cups (it’s a big salad!)
Pin this now to find it later
Pin ItI use 2 cups each cauliflower florets (about 1/2 medium-sized head,) carrots (roughly 4 medium carrots,) and cherry tomatoes (a 10oz package.)
Plus 1 cucumber that I seeded before chopping so the dressing wouldn’t get watery (use an English cucumber if you don’t want to scrape out the seeds,) plus 1 chopped bell pepper. I chose yellow for the beautiful color, but it’s totally up to you!
Last step is to drizzle on the super tart vinaigrette, which contains:
- Extra virgin olive oil
- Red wine vinegar
- Minced shallots
- Dijon mustard
- Italian seasoning
- Minced garlic cloves
- Salt
- Pepper
Shake the ingredients together in a jar or whisk in a bowl. Pour 3/4 of the vinaigrette over the vegetables then toss and stash in the refrigerator to marinate for at least 4 hours or up to overnight — it just gets better as it sits.
FYI this vinaigrette is very tart, which I happen to love. If it’s a little too tart for you, add more oil and/or honey to taste.
Just before serving, toss with the remaining vinaigrette then season with salt and pepper and you’ve got yourself an easy, healthy, fresh side dish that’s perfect for any day or occasion. Enjoy!
More Fresh and Healthy Salad Recipes
- Healthy Chickpea Salad
- Italian Quinoa Salad
- Fruit Salad Recipe for a Crowd
- Cucumber and Tomato Salad
- Jennifer Aniston Salad
- Chickpea Chicken Salad
- Italian Chickpea Salad
- Everyday Kale Salad
- Greek Chickpea Salad
Ingredients
- 2 cups cauliflower florets
- 2 cups cherry or grape tomatoes, ~10oz
- 2 cups chopped carrots, ~4 medium carrots
- 1 cucumber, seeded then chopped
- 1 bell pepper, any color, seeded then chopped
For the Vinaigrette:
- 1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
- 1/2 cup red wine vinegar
- 2 Tablespoons minced shallots
- 4 teaspoons Dijon mustard
- 2 teaspoons Italian seasoning
- 2 cloves garlic, pressed or minced
- salt and pepper
Directions
For the Vinaigrette:
- Add ingredients to a jar with a tight-fitting lid or bowl then shake or whisk to combine. Taste then add more salt, pepper, and/or oil if necessary (this dressing is very tart so add more oil if it’s too tart for your tastes.)
- Add vegetables to a very large bowl then dress with 3/4 of the vinaigrette. Toss then refrigerate for 4 hours or up to overnight. Toss with remaining vinaigrette and season with salt and pepper to taste just before serving.
Notes
- Use your favorite blend of fresh, raw vegetables — you’ll need 10 cups total.
Nutrition
Nutritional values are estimates only. Please read our full nutrition information disclaimer.
Looks absolutely mouthwatering! Great for outdoor gatherings.
So good! I did add a touch of honey (not really for sweetness but more to balance out the vinegar) and a can of cannelloni beans and it was delicious!!
Love the bean addition!! So glad you liked it, Jessica!
How would this work for a kabob, if the vegetables were left in little bigger chunks? Marinate overnight, then string on a kabob stick to serve at a picnic….no forks needed?
This is a great entertaining recipe to make as you can make the day before. Nice and refreshing on a hot day! Yummy!
Excellent summer salad. This will get compliments at your next BBQ. Seriously.
I just made this and it is in the fridge. Do you have the nutritional info?
This was so delicious and flavorful and perfect when you dont want to heat up your kitchen in the summer!
I would have loved to have the nutritional information for this recipe. Like you, so many people out there suffer from various problems and have to watch their salt content, weight, etc. I loved your recipe!!!
Thank you for this absolutely scrummy recipe! Made it to bring to our family Christmas dinner and it was completely gobbled up. Especially made the family vegan happy. I did add more cauliflower (doubled it) because that’s everyone’s favorite, and there was more than enough dressing to handle it. Yum!
Yum. Made thos colorful salad for a world cup party. Absolutely divine. This will be in my frequent rotation
This vinaigrette is the absolute best I have ever tasted, much less made! It will be my go to for all things veggie, and also as ‘hoagie oil.’ Thanks for sharing. I only recently discovered your site and I love it!
Oh I’m so glad to hear it, Patricia!! Yes, great call on using it for subs – yum!!
Ok…WOW! I just made this and I am over the moon excited about how delicious it is! Who knew something so seemingly simple would be this good?! Your recipes literally never fail me. Thanks!
You are too kind, Kim! Thanks for your great feedback – I’m so glad you enjoyed the salad!
Loved this salad! So perfect during the summer months when vegetables are plentiful and it’s hot outside. My mother used to make this with Kraft Italian Dressing.