Great Healthy Salad Recipes

The salad has long been the dieters friend and enemy combined. The salad can be a great source of vitamins and minerals when dieting. But it can also be the bane of a dieter's existence when the salads are bland and unfulfilling. But salad does not have to be your enemy. Make salad your best friend in dieting with these great healthy salad recipes!

This is fast becoming a favorite, and is one of the healthy salad recipes being served up in restaurants today. Use the leafy salad as a bed for chicken salad, egg salad, or tuna salad. Top with tomatoes, a low fat cheese, and cucumbers. With the flavors of the chicken salad, tuna salad, or egg salad, you will not need those fatty dressings, or their chalky tasting low fat equivalents.

Top the leafy salad with cold meats like thin strips of unprocessed ham, strips of cold grilled chicken breast, or tuna. If you grill the meat before hand with seasonings, then add the seasoned meat to your salad, it will add flavor without fatty dressings. Be creative. You could alter these healthy salad recipes by grilling soy burgers or tofu in place of the meats.

The best, most filling healthy salad recipes are chefs salad. These salads tend to be avoided because they are often topped with fatty toppings, making the salad anything but healthy. But you can actually add quite a bit to a chef's salad without using these fatty toppings. Top your favorite leafy salad greens like raw spinach, iceberg lettuce, and romaine lettuce with lots of healthy veggies. Use shredded carrots, chopped celery, sliced cucumber, cherry tomatoes or tomato slices, asparagus, broccoli trees, cauliflower trees, and other veggies. Add some chopped hard boiled egg whites, cubed tofu, thinly sliced lean ham, chunks of chicken breast, or tuna. Top it off with some low fat cheese and low carb croutons, and you have a salad that is filling, and can't be beat.

Another great version of healthy salad recipes is to add fruit to your bed of leafy salad. You can add apple slices, orange slices, mandarin oranges, pears, peaches, plums, or strawberries. With all of the fruit in this salad, no dressing or flavoring is required, and it is a great way to get in those required servings of fruits into your diet.

Pasta salads can also be healthy salad recipes. Instead of using fat like mayo or oils, create a vinegar based dressing using light vinegar. Mix in plenty of finely chopped veggies, snow peas, or other vegetables. Season the pasta salad with fresh herbs and spices like garlic, basil, and oregano.

You can find many more great healthy salad recipes by going to the book store or your local library and searching for healthy salad recipes books. You can also find lots of healthy salad recipes at websites like Food Network, or just by doing an internet search for free healthy salad recipes.