Say goodbye to boring salads and hello to my famous Italian chopped salad recipe! Simply add the chopped salad ingredients into a large bowl, drizzle with homemade Italian vinaigrette, toss and serve. Easy and ABSOLUTELY DELICIOUS, this makes a great main course or side salad!
An Absolutely Delicious Chopped Salad Recipe
Everyone needs a go-to salad recipe, and this easy Italian chopped salad recipe is mine! Crunchy, fresh, and absolutely delicious, we make this for dinner at least once a week. The salad ingredients are adaptable, so you can make swaps based on what you have on hand – or what’s in season.
But the best part? This salad is so easy: chop up the salad ingredients, toss them in a large bowl, add dressing, then toss and serve!
Seriously… this chopped salad recipe is so flavorful and satisfying you forget you’re even eating a salad. Because it’s a total flavor explosion that’ll have you reaching for seconds and thirds.
Easy to Adapt
Unlike 99.9% of the recipes I share, this chopped salad recipe is quite adaptable! So while I firmly believe this salad tastes best made with all the recommended ingredients, feel free to adapt to suit your tastes. You can even make some additions.
- For a Greek salad twist, try adding feta cheese, roasted red peppers, and kalamata olives.
- Craving more crunch? Try adding diced bell peppers or a handful of homemade croutons.
- Want more cheese? Add grated Parmesan cheese or swap the sharp cheese for fresh mozzarella! No pepperoni? Swap it for salami or any cured meat you enjoy.
Ingredients for Italian Salad
- Lettuce: Romaine lettuce hearts and radicchio make up our crunchy, fresh, delicious salad base. Not a fan of radicchio? Leave it out and add an extra romaine heart! You could also swap the romaine for iceberg lettuce if needed.
- Pasta: This is NOT a pasta salad. But a small amount of pasta adds an unexpected texture! And makes this salad hearty enough to be a meal on its own. We love ditalini, but orzo will also work fine.
- Celery: Thinly sliced, this adds crunch and a subtle sweet freshness you’ll absolutely love. You can totally skip this ingredient if you don’t have it easily available.
- Cherry Tomatoes: Look for juicy ones, because dry tomatoes are the bane of my existence and should never be used in a salad. Grape tomatoes or sun-dried tomatoes will also work.
- Red Onion: But if you prefer another variety of onion or even scallions, go for it!
- Cannellini Beans: Be sure you drain these well, give them a good rinse, and then pat them dry before adding them into the salad. If you can’t find this variety of bean, try another variety of white beans or use chickpeas.
- Sun-Dried Tomatoes: These add so much delicious flavor and texture! Just be sure to use the oil marinated variety, which work best here.
- Marinated Artichoke Hearts: You don’t need to pat the oil off of these, just chop and toss them right in! Not a fan? Feel free to leave them out.
- Black Olives: Another great options is castelvetrano olives, which are more mild and buttery than black olives!
- Pepperoncini Peppers: Salty, pickled, and crunchy… these add so much to this salad. Banana peppers would make a fine replacement if need be.
- Pepperoni: I like to use a stick of pepperoni and cut it into chunks, but feel free to cut ribbons with deli pepperoni or use salami instead. If you don’t eat cured meat, leave this out. You can sub grilled chicken or shrimp for added protein.
- Sharp Provolone Cheese: If you can’t find this, feel free to use chunks of fontina, crumbled gorgonzola, or those yummy marinated mini fresh mozzarella balls.
- Cucumber: I like to use English or Persian cucumbers here for extra crunch and freshness, but a regular cucumber (peeled) will work.
Toss and Serve
Making this recipe is extremely easy, with the most time consuming part being chopping the salad ingredients. After that, you simply toss everything in a large bowl, toss, and serve.
To save time making this recipe, you can absolutely pre-chop the salad ingredients. You can even place them in your large bowl and toss them together. But don’t add the dressing until right before you plan on serving.
You’ll want to wait to add the dressing until right before you plan on serving. And even then I suggest adding part of the dressing, then drizzling on more if desired. Because while everyone loves a well dressed salad… almost no one loves a soggy one.
Make the Dressing!
This is literally our “house salad dressing” because it’s so easy, delicious, and adaptable. Simply combine olive oil, red wine vinegar, honey, Dijon mustard, garlic, oregano, salt, pepper, and pepper flakes and mix until well combined.
I really don’t suggest using dried oregano in place of fresh, but if you must, reduce the amount to 1/4 teaspoon! Do not sub garlic powder for fresh garlic.
Jump to the recipe below for the full ingredient list and recipe!
Classic Italian Recipes to Serve it With:
More Italian Salad Recipes:
- Easy Italian Veggie Pasta Salad
- Italian Macaroni Salad
- Chicken Bruschetta Quinoa Salad
- 15-Minute Italian Pasta Salad
Big Italian Chopped Salad
Ingredients
For the Italian Dressing:
- 1/2 cup (113ml) Italian olive oil
- 1/3 cup (76ml) red wine vinegar
- 1 and 1/2 Tablespoons (38ml) honey
- 2 teaspoons dijon mustard
- 2 cloves garlic minced
- 1 teaspoon fresh oregano minced
- 1 teaspoon fine sea salt more to taste
- 1/2 teaspoon freshly cracked black pepper
- 1/4 teaspoon crushed red pepper flakes optional
For the Salad:
- 1 cup ditalini pasta cooked to al dente and cooled
- 2 hearts romaine lettuce chopped
- 1 small radicchio chopped
- 2 celery ribs thinly sliced
- 1 pint cherry tomatoes cut in half
- 1 small red onion diced
- 1 15 ounce can cannellini beans drained, rinsed, and patted dry
- 1 cup oil-packed sun-dried tomato halves drained and chopped
- 1 6.5 ounce jar marinated artichoke hearts drained and chopped
- 1/2 cup black olives cut in half
- 1/2 cup pepperoncini sliced into rings
- 8 ounces pepperoni cut into rounds
- 8 ounces sharp provolone cheese cut into bite-sized cubes
- 1 cup chopped cucumber
Instructions
For the Italian Dressing:
- In a medium bowl, combine the oil, vinegar, honey, mustard, garlic, oregano, salt, pepper, and pepper flakes. Vigorously whisk until well combined.
For the Salad:
- In a large salad bowl combine all of the ingredients.
- Pour 3/4 of the dressing over the salad and toss until well coated. Add more dressing as desired. Serve at once!
Absolutely loved this salad! It’s huge which makes it great for dinner parties or if you want to meal prep salad for the week. Added some extra olives but otherwise made as is!
So delicious!! I made it just as called for instead of sun dried tomatoes I used chopped red peppers (just what I had on hand)
Will for sure make again!
Super yummy! Love a good salad with everything in it. I always hate the process of making a salad — but I’ll have this for lunches all week long and for that I’m am thankful.