Summer Quinoa Salads with Lemon Dill Dressing! Hello shrimp, quinoa, tomato, cucumber, feta – my favorite healthy meal prep!
Summer Quinoa Salad Jars with Lemon Dill Dressing
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Omg!! Made this salad for Saturday night date night dinner (along with turkey burgers) and it was a hit! 🙂 I’m the lesser than cook in the relationship so I was so pleased that this first time recipe was well liked by both of us. Thank You! 🙂
Will be using for lunches this week too:)
Let’s just start there, okay?
Because THERE is a very good place to start. It involves:
- Quinoa
- Cucumber
- Tomato
- Sun dried peppers
- Feta cheese
- Grilled shrimp
- Curlycue greens
- And a bucket of lemon dill dressing.
That would be enough, wouldn’t it? (I just ate it for lunch and I can assure you that it is and was more than enough.)
BUT.
I like it when things are a little more fun, a little more convenient, a little more real-life-able. Which is why this post is actually called Summer Salad Jars.
As in, let’s put this salad right on up in a jar.
Do you know what’s beautiful about this? The jar thing?
A) Jars. They look pretty in your fridge, and they SUPER CONVENIENT. It’s lunch in literally two shakes: shake the jar out, and toss it all up.
B) The tomatoes and the dressing sit in the bottom of the jar together and actually get BETTER and JUICIER and MORE FLAVOR LOADED the longer they sit in the fridge. The quinoa, too – it can handle that little bit of moisture from the dressing! Think of that lemony, garlicky, dill-punch of flavor just hanging out in there, giving your quinoa the royal treatment. How about a YES MA’AM on that one.
I haven’t been a huge supporter of jar salads in the past because I was skeptical that a lettuce salad, sitting a jar with a bunch of stuff for four days, would really be a good thing to eat.
But this is not a lettuce salad. That’s why I’m into it. It has the extra-delicious texture of a deli-style salad (you know, chicken salad, potato salad, that kind of thing) and all of its ingredients are sturdy enough to handle the weekly fridge sit.
And should you find yourself lacking for dinner, throw a few shrimp on the grill and pop em on top of your salad, with a few delicate curlycue greens in there for Instagram reasons.
Riiiight?! Are we not so hot with this right now?
Okay, easy meal prep. This week. Quinoa, veg, lemon dill dressing. Very healthy, very goals-y.
You got this! Please report back.
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Summer Quinoa Salad Jars with Lemon Dill Dressing
- Total Time: 30 minutes
- Yield: 8 servings (16 ounce jars) 1x
Description
Summer Quinoa Salads with Lemon Dill Dressing! Hello shrimp, quinoa, tomato, cucumber, feta – my favorite healthy meal prep!
Ingredients
Scale
Lemon Dill Dressing
- 3/4 cup olive oil
- 1/4 cup water
- 2 tablespoons white vinegar
- 1 clove garlic
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- fresh lemon juice (to taste)
- a handful of fresh dill (to taste)
- a handful of fresh parsley (optional)
Summer Salad Jars
- 2 cups quinoa (or other pasta, quinoa, couscous, etc.)
- 2 pints of grape tomatoes
- 2 large cucumbers
- 1–2 small jars of sun dried tomatoes or peppers (I used DeLallo brand)
- 1 cup feta cheese
Instructions
- Dressing: Blend all dressing ingredients together until smooth.
- Grains: Cook quinoa according to package directions. Set aside to cool.
- Build Your Beautiful Jars: In each jar, layer a little bit of dressing, tomatoes, quinoa, cucumbers, sun dried peppers, and feta. Store sealed jars in the fridge up to 4 days!
- Serve: When you’re ready to serve, empty the jar into a bowl. Stir to combine. Voila!
Equipment
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Notes
I love dill, and I never measure it exactly. For those who do want to measure, I would guess my “handful” is equal to a loose 1/4 cup! Same for the parsley. This is also delicious made with whole wheat orzo or other cooked pasta! I like to add some finishing touches, too – extra salt and pepper, more lemon juice, fresh greens, and maybe some sunflower seeds for crunch! Yummy! You can totally add some cooked chickpeas, lentils, a piece of grilled chicken, fish, or shrimp added to the salad after it’s all mixed (as pictured). Personally I would wait to add the chicken/shrimp until just serving so the salad jars stay fresher for longer!
- Prep Time: 30 minutes
- Category: Lunch
- Cuisine: American
Keywords: jar salads, meal prep salads, quinoa salad
One More Thing!
This recipe is part of our best healthy summer salads page. Check it out!
Filed Under: All Recipes Dairy-Free Gluten-Free Healthy Lemon Lunch Meal Prep Pasta Quinoa Salads Sugar-Free Summer Tomato Vegan
June 4, 2018
Nice to meet you!
I’m Lindsay and I ♡ FOOD. I used to be a teacher, and now making food and writing about it online is my full-time job. I love talking with people about food, and I'm so glad you're here.
Did you make a recipe? Tag @pinchofyum on Instagram so we can find you!
YUM! Is this the recipe I saw on your instagram stories? I’ve been looking forward to this recipe! Love the summer produce and meal-prep aspect of it!
Yes, this is the one! 🙂
These look perfect for summer and jars do look pretty in the fridge. This are on my to do list, yum!!!
Hope you enjoy them, Ana!
looks like the ultimate summer salad in a jar! mmmm!
Definitely is!
Love the use of jars here!
Are nutrition facts being added? Thank you!!!
Hi Kayla! You can find the nutrition in the recipe card at the end. 🙂
How much fiber per serving or per recipe?
OOOH that lemon dill dressing sounds amazing!
great serving/prep size and love that it’s a jar and NOT a plastic thing, I don’t mind leaving this stuff in a jar, even lettuce! But plastic, even plastic wrap, no, so anyway thank you for another very creative idea
Glad to hear it, Sabrina!
Does the 2 cups quinoa mean cooked or uncooked?
Uncooked! You’ll cook it in step 2 of the directions.
looks yummy
This is amazing, I heard of this jar for the first time.But to be honest It looks amazing.These jars are the best to carry a salad and this is something exceptional.
I have so many of these jars which I use for my jam making so you’ve inspired me to put your salad in them now, looks so fresh and tasty:-)
Salads are SO tricky to store ahead of time because it can be really challenging to alleviate soggy lettuce. That’s why mason jars are so fantastic! Love that this recipe also contains quinoa. Next time I make a mason jar salad, I’ll omit the feta cheese but replicate this completely otherwise! Might add some peanuts and tofu too!
I was soooo excited to make this!! I just did today & I totally killed it 😉 this recipe is PERFECTION! I’ll probably be making this every day to be honest. Xo
So glad to hear that, Natasha!
Do you think you can freeze any excess dressing ?
I’m on a diet! I like Salad but Salads are so tricky to store ahead of time
I can’t wait to try this recipe! It looks delicious! What size jar do you recommend using for this recipe?
We used the pint-size jars!
Love this! Can you help with approx how much dressing etc should go in each jar? I’m making these for someone recovering from surgery and want to make sure I get it right!
About 2-3 tablespoons, or closer to 1/4 cup if they like a lot of dressing!
Jar salads are the best for on the go and picnics! These ones look delicious 🙂
So true. Thanks, Jess!
I made this in a bowl to take my son’s double header baseball game last night. I layered quinoa and tomatoes with a little dressing on the bottom. I topped that with massaged kale, garlic roasted chickpeas, cucumbers and feta cheese. I took along some extra dressing for the top. First off, I was getting looks of envy from the other parents. Second, it was AMAZING!!! This is a summer meal at its finest!
I forgot to add that I also used sundries tomatoes on top. That took this salad to another level!
So glad to hear that, Sharon! 🙂
You’ve been teasing us with this on Instastories…it looks fantastic! Love the idea of adding shrimp. Or maybe chicken? YUM.
These look amazing! Will definitely be trying this in the next few weeks. I wanted to ask a question for future recipes on your blog: do you think you might start mentioning the measurements of ingredients in European sizes (grams, milliliters, etc.) too? It’s fine if you’re not planning to do this, but just thought I’d ask because I’m pretty sure you have a large following overseas as well by now and it would save us a lot of time having to use conversion charts for all your recipes 🙂
Back in the 1980’s, my grandmother who’s now deceased used to can homemade pickles in a mason jar. Then from time to time, I assume she would ferment other foods in a jar. Canning is a great way to stay laser focused not only with eating the right healthy foods, but also consume food in rightful portions. This way, eating portion-controlled food out of a jar or otherwise will be friendly on your metabolism to digest.
I could use something like Quinoa salad jar food right about now. It’s good for men especially because Quinona naturally raises Testosterone. I did 20 minutes of treadmill cardio today and restarted my 2018 weight loss transformation. Looking forward to previewing more blogs so i can get some creative ideas how to put a healthy meal together. Thanks for this post Lindsay. 🙂
Sounds so yum!
May I ask where these pretty bowls are from?
E || OH LA LATKES
Very good! I like it
Thank you for another great recipe!!!!