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Summer Salad Recipe

4.5 from 8 votes
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posted: 07/10/19

This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure policy
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This post may contain affiliate links. Please read my disclosure policy

This Summer Salad Recipe is full of delicious fresh ingredient and made perfect with my Lemon Poppyseed Dressing. This is a fast summer salad that you will want to bring to all the summer picnics and BBQs!

overhead view of a summer salad recipe with fresh raspberries, blueberries, radishes, romain lettuce, walnuts, and goat cheese all with a lemon poppyseed dressing in a big blue bowl

It is getting so hot around here, and I’m getting to that point in summer where if I eat too much, I feel extra hot and sticky. Guess what that means it’s time for?? A great delicious summer salad recipe that makes a perfect lunch entree, or a simple option to bring to a potluck.

I’m proud to be partnering with Meijer to bring you this amazing and easy salad recipe!

Making the Perfect Summer Salad

I love making salads in the summer for a meal because it is the best time to find super fresh ingredients that work perfectly in a salad. While, I love buying fresh produce for side dishes (like my roasted beets or my oven roasted asparagus) at the local farmer’s market, that doesn’t always work because it’s just one day a week.

Imagine my joy and excitement when I was with Meijer in Grand Rapids, Michigan earlier this year and they told me all about how hard they work to make sure they source produce as close to their stores as possible! Being a midwestern company, it is extremely important to Meijer that they support local businesses, including local farmers. There are some farmers that they have had relationships with for more than 30 years!

So even though I can only go to my local farmer’s market once a week, I can feel like I’m at the farmer’s market, buying local, every time I visit my Meijer store.

pile of fresh beets, uncut on a wooden cutting board
A white strainer filled with blueberries

For this delicious summer salad recipe, I thought it would be good to balance out the sweet and savory flavors of summer. I grabbed some fresh radishes and some gorgeous plump blueberries from Mejier. The blueberries are sweet and perfect in a salad because they just need a fresh rinse and no additional chopping. The radishes balance them perfectly with the zip they add to this salad.

From there, I grabbed some raspberries (yay! another thing I don’t have to chop), some walnuts, and some goat cheese. The goat cheese also has a nice tang that compliments the sweetness of the blueberries, raspberries, and lemon poppyseed dressing that finishes off this salad.

I was so happy to find packs of three Romaine hearts at my local Meijer. They are so easy to slice down the middle, flip, give another slice to, and then roughly chop. They make this salad come together fast.

ingredients for a fast summer salad recipe on a wood chopping board: radishes, romain lettuce, blueberries, and raspberries

Ingredients for this Summer Salad

There are so many different ways you could make a summer salad, but I think this is such a good summer salad recipe with its fresh ingredients and beautiful colors.

You will need:

  • three heads of romaine lettuce
  • small bunch of radishes
  • blueberries
  • raspberries
  • goat cheese
  • roasted walnuts
overhead view of easy summer salad recipe with raspberries, blueberries, goat cheese, walnuts, radishes, and romain lettuce in a big blue bowl

Summer Salad Dressing

For this salad, I made a really simple Lemon Poppy Seed Dressing. I bet you already have most of the ingredients you already need!

  • olive oil
  • lemon juice
  • granulated sugar
  • salt
  • dry mustard
  • poppy seeds

If you want to stretch this dressing further or make it creamy, add a little non flavored greek yogurt to it! About a half cup for the whole recipe.

Serving Sizes

I always struggle with writing the actual recipe when it comes to salads because I don’t like measuring! I just throw things in as my mood strikes me. But I know that’s a really bad way to write a food blog.

I will absolutely give you directions and measurements, but if you are making it for yourself, just do what your mood says. And enjoy it. That’s part of the joy in cooking.

  • For One:  Chop up one Romaine Heart and add in handfuls of the remaining ingredients. Top with a little dressing (about two tablespoons), and add more to taste.
  • For Two: Half of this recipe will make two lunch sized portions of this recipe (that is the amount you see pictured).
  • For More:  This recipe makes 14 cups. That is a nice side salad for 6 people, and a sweet little side dish for 10 or more.
woman pouring lemon poppy seed dressing on a simple summer salad recipe

Substitutions and Variations

One of my favorite things about salads is how easy they are to mix up and change. You can switch this or that and it’s not going to greatly complicate or change things.

  • I used roasted walnuts, but you could add sliced almonds you lightly toast or any other nut. Nut allergy? Just leave them out.
  • If you want to make this even fancier, use candied walnuts!
  • Don’t like goat cheese? Swap it for feta or shaved parmesan!
  • Swap the Romaine lettuce for spinach for a whole different feel to this salad.
  • If you don’t love lemon, you will love the dressing on this Strawberry Spinach Salad instead!

Other Great Summer Salads

If you find your cart at Meijer completely full of delicious fresh summer produce and you aren’t sure what to do with it all, try some of these other great summer salad recipes:

raspberries, blueberries, walnuts, goat cheese, radishes, and romain lettuce in a bowl for a great summer salad recipe
overhead view of a summer salad recipe with fresh raspberries, blueberries, radishes, romain lettuce, walnuts, and goat cheese all with a lemon poppyseed dressing in a big blue bowl
4.50 from 8 votes

Summer Salad Recipe

Serves: 6 people
(tap # to scale)
Prep: 15 minutes
This Summer Salad Recipe is full of delicious fresh ingredient and made perfect with my Lemon Poppyseed Dressing.  This is a fast summer salad that you will want to bring to all the summer picnics and BBQs!

Ingredients

Salad Ingredients

  • 3 Romain hearts chopped
  • 1 cup roasted walnuts see note #1
  • 1 cup blueberries
  • 1 pint raspberries
  • 10 small radishes washed, trimmed, and sliced thin
  • 5 ounces goat cheese crumbled

Lemon Poppy Seed Dressing

  • 2/3 cup olive oil
  • 1/3 cup lemon juice see note #2
  • 1/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 1/8 teaspoon salt (or just a pinch)
  • 1 teaspoon ground mustard
  • 1 tablespoon poppy seeds
  • 1 tablespoon honey optional

Instructions

  • Toss all of the salad ingredients.
  • Whisk together the olive oil, lemon juice, sugar, salt, and mustard until the sugar is completely dissolved. Taste and add more lemon until it has enough of a lemon flavor for you. Add more honey if it becomes overwhelmingly acidic.
  • Stir poppy seeds into the dressing.
  • Serve salad dressing on the side and allow people to dress their salad to taste.

Notes

  1. Roast the walnuts at 400 degrees on a parchment lined baking sheet for 5 minutes to deepen their flavor. (Optional step.)
  2.   The balance of sweet and acid in this salad dressing is really important. Start with 1/3 cup lemon juice. If it doesn’t taste enough like lemon to you add a little more, about a teaspoon at a time.  If you go too far, add a tablespoon of honey to counter balance it.
Author: Lisa Longley
Course: Salad
Cuisine: American
overhead view of a summer salad recipe with fresh raspberries, blueberries, radishes, romain lettuce, walnuts, and goat cheese all with a lemon poppyseed dressing in a big blue bowl

did you make this

Summer Salad Recipe

I’d love to see what you made! Tag me @lisasimplejoy and hashtag it #simplejoyrecipes!

Hi! I'm Lisa Longley, and I am committed to giving you simple dinner ideas and recipes that are easy to make; recipes that will fill your home with joy. I am the owner and author of SimpleJoy.com and I'm so glad that you are here.

Reader Interactions

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  1. wayne r schneiderwind says

    5 stars
    Looks great I’m going to try them all

    • Lisa Longley says

      I Hope you love it!

  2. Crystal Campbell says

    Looks good I want to try them all.

    • Lisa Longley says

      I hope you enjoy it!

  3. Nancy Salmon says

    Can you use blue cheese instead of got cheese in this salad?

    • Lisa Longley says

      Definitely! That would be great in here!

  4. Maureen says

    5 stars
    Berries are in season and this made a beautiful salad for a small gathering of friends

    • Lisa Longley says

      I’m so glad you liked it!

  5. Connie says

    This salad – fabulous summer salad, was exactly what
    Less chopping smaller blueberries, radishes, raspberries, walnut, chunks of romaine lettuce, and goat cheese. I wanted to make my dressing and put it on the side of each plate. Can’t wait. Thank you so much.
    Nice colors, not too much lettuce, every ingredient that I was hoping for.

    • Lisa Longley says

      I hope you love it!

  6. Anita says

    1 star
    I was excited to make this Salad for my husbands surprise birthday tomorrow. Well, I cannot do much prepping tonight as I would normally do because you guessed it, my husband is home. I decided to make the Poppy Seed Dressing. That would surely save me some time tomorrow. I followed the instructions to the letter and I am so disappointed. It has a unusual taste and I thought it might be my E.O.O so I tossed that batch and drove to the store to buy a lighter E.O.O and more Lemons. Still bad tasting. I will make the Salad tomorrow as I have already purchased all of the ingredients and will look on for another dressing recipe. Yuk!

    • Lisa Longley says

      Anita, I’m so sorry this dressing was a miss for you. I love this recipe, but tastes and ingredients of course vary. Did you try balancing the flavors as suggested in the note?

  7. April says

    How long does the dressing last in the fridge?

    • Lisa Longley says

      About three months! But of course use your best discretion – if it looks or smells off before that, toss it.

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