I love serving salads alongside dinner or sometimes making a meal out of one. A bowl of lettuce with bottled dressing gets old fast. The best salads are loaded with color, texture, and plenty of interesting ingredients.

A good salad is one of the easiest ways to use what you have on hand. Raid the fridge. Toss in extra vegetables from the crisper, a handful of berries or chopped fruit, leftover grains, beans, nuts, seeds, or a little cheese. Before you know it, that simple salad has turned into something satisfying and worth looking forward to.

Loaded salads are also great for balancing out the rest of the day’s meals. Maybe breakfast was rushed, lunch came from a drive-thru, or dinner is pizza night.

Here’s your end-of-the-day chance to make up for it.

Best of all, there are no rules. A loaded salad is less about following a recipe and more about building something fresh, colorful, and delicious from what’s already in your kitchen.

Where to Start on a Loaded Salad?

Start with Greens

Any salad green is a good place to start, but mixing things up keeps salads more interesting. I love adding a handful of spinach, arugula, or kale and herbs to more traditional salad greens for extra color, flavor, and texture.

Leaf lettuces, spring mixes, mesclun blends, romaine, Bibb, and Boston lettuce all bring something different to the bowl. Even iceberg has its place. It adds crunch and freshness that’s hard to beat. The trick is not getting stuck in a salad rut. Try different combinations and see what you like.

Choose a Protein

Protein is what turns a side salad into something more substantial. Leftover chicken, steak, salmon, shrimp, hard-boiled eggs, beans, lentils, chickpeas, nuts, seeds, or a little cheese can all do the job.

This is another great opportunity to use what you have on hand. A few slices of leftover steak, some rotisserie chicken, half a can of chickpeas, or the last bit of cheese from the deli drawer can go a long way.

Don’t worry too much about rules. Mix and match. Some ingredients pull double duty, adding protein and healthy fats at the same time. The goal is simply to build a salad that’s satisfying enough to keep you full and interesting enough to make you want to eat it.

Add Some Temptation

A salad doesn’t have to be virtuous to be good. If a few croutons, some dried fruit, a sprinkle of nuts, or a slightly sweeter dressing make a salad more appealing, go for it.

The goal isn’t perfection. The goal is a salad you’ll actually enjoy eating.

A handful of grapes, apple slices, dried cranberries, homemade croutons, or a favorite dressing can add flavor, texture, and just the right touch of indulgence. After all, a salad that’s eaten is far better than a perfectly healthy one that gets pushed aside.

The Loaded Salad Formula:

If all this sounds a little overwhelming, here’s my foolproof formula. Start with these building blocks, and you’ll be well on your way to a loaded salad that’s colorful, satisfying, and anything but boring.

🥬 Start with greens
(Whatever you like, or a mix.)

🥩 Add a protein
(Chicken, steak, fish, seafood, tofu, eggs, beans, or chickpeas.)

🥒 Add a couple vegetables
(Raw, steamed, roasted, fresh, or leftover – just raid the fridge.)

🌾 Add grains if you’d like
(Quinoa, farro, barley, rice, couscous, or whatever leftovers you have on hand.)

🍎 Add fruit if you’d like
(Crisp or juicy, fresh or dried. Tomatoes count, too.)

🧀 Add something rich
(Cheese, avocado, olives, nuts, or seeds.)

🥜 Add something crunchy
(Croutons, nuts, seeds, crispy vegetables, or whatever adds a little texture.)

🥄 Finish with dressing
(Homemade or store-bought – whatever gets the salad on the table.)

Prepackaged and Salad Kits:

I rarely buy salad kits.

They’re expensive (sometimes 4 to 10 times the amount of making your own, and for me, they’re a little limiting and often disappointing. A kit may seem convenient, but once you start building your own salads, you’ll discover there are far more possibilities sitting in your refrigerator, pantry, and produce drawer than any kit can offer.

The same goes for dressing. Homemade dressings are usually less expensive, easy to customize, and made from ingredients you already have on hand. Once you get comfortable making a few simple vinaigrettes and creamy dressings, it’s hard to go back to relying on bottles.

That’s not to say there’s never a place for convenience. Sometimes a salad kit is exactly what you need on a busy day. But most of the time, I find homemade salads fresher, more interesting, and a much better value.

Homemade Dressings:

Homemade dressings are one of the easiest ways to add variety to your salads. Most take just a few minutes to make, and many can be mixed right in a jar with ingredients you probably already have on hand – and they are ingredients you can pronounce.

Many dressings can be made ahead in a larger amount than just for one salad, and stored in the refrigerator for days or even weeks, depending on the ingredients. A quick shake is usually all that’s needed before serving.

One of my favorite tricks is to make extra. If I’m already pulling out the vinegar, oil, herbs, and seasonings for one dressing, I often make a second, or even a third, at the same time. It only takes a few extra minutes, and having several dressings waiting in the refrigerator makes it easy to throw together a great salad any night of the week.

The best part? Homemade dressings are easy to customize. Make them tangier, sweeter, creamier, or herbier. Once you get comfortable making your own, the possibilities are nearly endless – and who knows? Maybe you’ll end up with your very own house dressing.