Summertime Chopped Veggie Salad with Creamy Shallot Vinaigrette

If you’re looking for a cool, crunchy raw veggie salad to put your green market haul to good use, this is it. Sweet corn salad has chopped fresh zucchini, bell peppers, tomatoes, celery and peas (you can use frozen). The mellow, creamy shallot vinaigrette blankets the fresh veg with a mildly sweet tanginess. Try this marinated vegetable salad for a light lunch with some warm French bread or as a side dish at your next cookout.

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During the sweltering Florida summer months, we love a cool, crunchy marinated vegetable salad to go with a simple rotisserie chicken or grilled pork chops. It’s light, healthy and the creamy shallot vinaigrette really compliments the raw veggies.

Ingredients for veggie salad

• Corn on the cob
• Zucchini
• Sweet Bell Peppers
• Heavy Ripe Tomatoes
• Celery (for crunch)
• Peas (you can use frozen peas that are thawed)
• Scallions
• Red Onion

How to remove corn from the cob

If you have one of those handy corn strippers, {affiliate link} it makes quick work of stripping the kernels from a corn cob, otherwise, you’ll need a bowl and a sharp knife.

1. Hold the corn cob vertically with the flat end of the cob steady in the bottom of the bowl.
2. Use a Chef’s knife to run the blade down the side of the cob, dispensing the sweet corn kernels into the bowl.
3. Rotate the cob and continue to strip the corn until all the kernels have been removed.

How to chop vegetables for marinated salad

Chopped veggie salads by name should be chopped. Look at the smallest ingredients in the salad — in this case, corn kernels and sweet peas. That’s about the size you want to chop the rest of the veg. Not minced, but a small dice. It’s important for the vegetables to be roughly the same size both for aesthetics as well as chewing.

Peas please…

For Fresh Peas – If you have fresh shelled peas, you’ll want to blanch and shock them before adding them to the salad. That simply means bringing a pot of water to a boil, cooking the peas until they’re tender, then transferring the peas to an ice bath to stop the cooking and retain their bright green color.

For Frozen Peas – Frozen peas have already been blanched and shocked (that’s why they’re both tender AND bright green). Just let the peas thaw before adding them to the sweet corn salad.

Ingredients for creamy shallot dressing

• Shallot Confit
• Red Wine Vinegar
• Honey
• Dijon Mustard
• Black Pepper
• Kosher Salt
• Parsley

A few weeks ago, I showed you how to make shallot confit — which is essentially a 2-ingredient, hands-off recipe. Yes, you should do this in advance for the shallots to achieve their soft, sweet best. It’s the oil poached shallots that make this creamy vinaigrette sweet instead of sharp and pungent.

What if I don’t have shallot confit made?

Note: If you’re in a rush and don’t have the confit ready to go for the veggie salad, you can replace the confit with one small shallot, minced (not the half cup of shallot confit that’s called for) and whisk the dressing by hand instead of in the food processor. If you process raw shallots in the food processor the dressing will be too sharp.

How to make shallot vinaigrette

1. Use a mini prep food processor (or blender) to blend the soft shallots with the vinegar, oil, dijon mustard, honey and salt. This makes a creamy emulsion.
2. Add the chopped parsley and pepper separately, after you’ve blended the dressing. If you add the parsley to the food processor, it will turn a weird gray-green color and the pepper will break down even further making the dressing too harsh for the sweet corn salad.

Dressing sweet corn salad with shallot vinaigrette

1. Add about ? cup of the creamy dressing to the raw veggie salad and toss to coat.
2. Taste the salad and if you think it needs more dressing, add 1 to 2 more tablespoons, toss again and taste.
3. You don’t want the marinated vegetable salad to be soggy, just seasoned with the dressing.
4. You probably won’t need the entire batch of shallot dressing for this salad, but any leftovers you have are great spooned over steamed vegetables or drizzled over fish or chicken.

Can I serve the chopped veggie salad immediately?

Yes it can be eaten as soon as you dress it, however refrigerating it for a few hours allows the vegetables to marinate in the shallot vinaigrette. Marinated vegetable salad can be served cold or at room temperature, I prefer it somewhere in between – like Goldilocks… the cool, crunchy summer veggies are just right.

How long will corn salad last refrigerated?

Sweet corn salad will hold up for 2 to 3 days covered in the refrigerator, however the peas will lose their vibrant color and the overall salad isn’t as crunchy after the second day. I recommend eating it the day you make it.

More veggie salads you might like:

• Heirloom Tomato Salad with Creamy Anchovy Dressing
• Tomato Peach Caprese
• Crunchy Kale and Cabbage Salad
• Mexican Chopped Salad
• Summer Squash and Courgette Salad

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