Ready within 20 minutes, this fresh strawberry salad with crisp and substantial butter lettuce is the perfect crowd pleasing summer salad. It’s made with simple 100% vegan ingredients, like juicy sweet strawberries, creamy avocado, and salty chopped pistachios. No cooking, no problems with this healthy and easy recipe! Filled with fresh flavours and plenty of fruit and veg to keep things light and bright for warmer days. The poppy seed dressing recipe here goes beyond basic with fresh additions of lemon and mint with a touch of maple syrup to sweeten naturally. I know you’re gonna love this summer salad!
I adore a classic, easy strawberry salad with slightly sweet poppy seed dressing. Over the years though, I’ve found that I prefer a more sturdy and crunchy lettuce to the typical baby spinach. The version I’ve been perfecting here features butter lettuce, also known as Boston, Bibb, Butterhead or butter crunch. The mild flavour and crisp texture are delicious foil to the sweet-tart strawberries.
The dressing is not super typical either! We keep the sweetness and poppy seeds, but also add fresh lemon juice and fresh mint. I blend up the dressing in stages so that I get pretty little flecks of mint throughout. Once the poppy seeds are stirred in at the end, the sweet, tart, and cool/fresh qualities are a wildly tasty combination with this strawberry avocado salad. Don’t forget some extra fresh mint on top of the finished dish!
To cut strawberries for salad, I just remove the leafy top part, flip the flat edge onto the cutting board, and then begin to cut nice slices. Simple! This is the same way I’d cut them for a summer fruit salad. You can slice the strawberries up to 2 hours ahead of time for assembling this dish. Just keep them in a sealed container in the fridge.
Hope you love the symphony of flavours here! A perfect bite has sweet strawberry and maple, crunchy but still silky lettuce, tart lemon, cool mint, lush avocado, and salty-nutty pistachios. Heaven on earth in the summertime alongside your favourite grilled proteins 🙂
Summer Fresh Strawberry Salad with Mint Poppy Seed Dressing
This fresh and vibrant strawberry salad features crunchy and silky butter lettuce, chopped pistachios, creamy avocado, and lemony mint poppy seed dressing. Ready in 20 minutes!
Servings 4
Ingredients
Dressing
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 2 tablespoons champagne/white wine vinegar
- 2 tablespoons maple syrup/agave nectar
- 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
- 1 small shallot, peeled
- ½ teaspoon vegan Worcestershire sauce
- sea salt and ground black pepper, to taste
- ⅓ cup olive oil
- ¼ cup fresh mint leaves
- 1 tablespoon poppy seeds
Salad
- 8-10 oz butter lettuce (also known as Bibb, Boston or butter Crunch)
- 2 cups chopped strawberries
- ¼ cup mint leaves, roughly chopped
- ¼ cup shelled salted pistachios, chopped
- sea salt and ground black pepper, to taste
- 1 large ripe avocado, peeled and diced
Notes
- You could top this salad with toasted sunflower seeds to keep it completely nut-free.
- Vegan Worcestershire sauce contains wheat. To make this gluten-free, simply substitute the same amount of Tamari.
- I used 3 small heads of butter lettuce here.
- If there’s a vegan feta that you love, a couple handfuls of it crumbled on top would be excellent!
Instructions
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Make the dressing. In an upright blender, combine the lemon juice, champagne vinegar, maple syrup, Dijon, shallot, Worcestershire sauce, salt, pepper, and olive oil. Blend on high until completely smooth, about 1 minute. Add the mint leaves and blend slowly until the mint appears finely minced in the dressing. Pour the dressing into a measuring cup/jar and stir in the poppy seeds. Set aside.
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Remove the cores of the butter lettuce and chop/tear into bite sized pieces. Place the lettuce in a large serving bowl. Add the strawberries, mint, and half of the pistachios. Season with salt and pepper and pour on half of the dressing. Toss to combine. Top the salad with avocado, chopped pistachios, and drizzle the remaining dressing (or as much as you’d like). Enjoy immediately.
