Mediterranean Quinoa Salad with spinach, sun-dried tomatoes, kalamata olives, feta, and a lemon vinaigrette. This healthy salad recipe makes the perfect light vegetarian meal, or side dish for sharing with friends and family.
Mediterranean quinoa salad is that picture perfect side dish to go alongside virtually any meal.
No matter the season, this hearty, flavorful salad recipe is well-loved!
Particularly lovely for family dinners, picnics, barbecues, or gatherings, this recipe serves 6 to 10 (depending on how many other side dishes are available).
In this sense, this Mediterranean Quinoa Salad also makes for an amazing meal prep recipe. It saves very well and tastes even better after sitting for a day or two!
Let’s chat about the ingredients.
Ingredients for Mediterranean Quinoa Salad:
Uncooked Quinoa: The star of the show here! We cook up a couple of cups of quinoa for the base of this Mediterranean quinoa salad.
Baby Spinach: This is how we know the salad is healthy. Just kidding. Spinach is added for a superfood vitamin infusion to boost the nutrition of the salad.
Red Onion: For added flavor, we sauté the onion for a generous amount of time to give it that caramelized flavor. If you love the bite of raw red onion, feel free to skip the sautéing step, and leave the onion raw.
Sun-Dried Tomatoes, Kalamata Olives, Feta Cheese: The briny, tangy ingredients that add so much flavor, texture, and spunk to this side dish.
For the dressing: Olive oil, cider vinegar, lemon juice. This combination is a simple dressing that brings everything together and adds a pop of flavor. If you love fresh garlic in your dressings, feel free to add one minced clove.
How to Make Mediterranean Quinoa Salad:
- Prepare the quinoa according to package instructions. Use a larger pot than necessary so that you have room to add spinach once the quinoa is finished cooking. Note: the key to a great quinoa is rinsing it very well and/or soaking it before cooking!
- While the quinoa is cooking, sauté the red onion over medium heat in a couple teaspoons of olive oil, until it is completely soft and golden-brown, about 10 to 15 minutes (Note: If you like the bite of raw onion, you can skip this step and leave the onion raw).
- In a mixing bowl, whisk together the olive oil, vinegar, and lemon juice to make the dressing.
- Once the quinoa has finished cooking, immediately remove it from the heat and add the baby spinach to the pot. Place the cover back on to help steam the spinach. Allow the spinach to soften about 5 minutes and then stir it in to the quinoa.
- Transfer the quinoa and spinach, sautéed onions, sun-dried tomatoes, olives, and feta cheese to a large serving bowl.
- Pour the dressing and sea salt over the salad and toss everything together until coated. Taste the salad for flavor, and add more sea salt or lemon juice to taste.
Serve this salad alongside your main entrée, and enjoy!
If you love artichoke hearts and capers, feel free to toss some in as well to ramp up the Mediterranean flair even more.
More Quinoa Salad Recipes:
- Roasted Winter Vegetable Quinoa Salad with Cider Vinaigrette
- Pesto Quinoa Salad with Asparagus, Avocado, and Kale
- Mango Edamame Quinoa Salad
- Grilled Zucchini, Corn, and Beet Quinoa Salad
- Roasted Sweet Potato Quinoa Salad with Maple-Orange Dressing
Enjoy!
Mediterranean Quinoa Salad
Ingredients
- 2 cups dry quinoa
- 2.5 ounces baby spinach
- 1/2 large red onion chopped
- 1 cup sun-dried tomatoes julienne cut, drained
- 1 cup kalamata olives pitted and halved
- 1/4 cup olive oil
- 2 tablespoons cider vinegar
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon sea salt to taste
- 4 ounces feta cheese crumbles
Instructions
- Prepare the quinoa according to package instructions. Use a larger pot than necessary so that you have room to add spinach once the quinoa is finished cooking. (note: the key to a great quinoa is rinsing it very well and/or soaking it before cooking!)
- While the quinoa is cooking, sauté the red onion over medium heat in a couple teaspoons of olive oil, until it is completely soft and golden-brown, about 10 to 15 minutes.
- In a mixing bowl, whisk together the olive oil, vinegar, and lemon juice.
- Once the quinoa has finished cooking, immediately remove it from the heat and add the baby spinach to the pot. Place the cover back on to help steam the spinach. Allow the spinach to soften about 5 minutes and then stir it in to the quinoa.
- Transfer the quinoa and spinach, sautéed onions, sun-dried tomatoes, olives, and feta cheese to a large serving bowl.
- Pour the oil/vinegar/lemon dressing and sea salt over the salad and toss everything together until coated. Taste the salad for flavor, and add more sea salt and/or lemon juice to taste.
This looks yummy! Can’t wait to make it for supper tonight.
Someone may have already asked this question, but perusing the comments’ section, I didn’t see it. Since I grew my own spinach, I need to know how much spinach by weight or volume? Or, at least, what size bag of spinach, since our grocer has 9 oz bags and one pound bags.
Thanks! 🙂
Hi Beverly! So glad you like the quinoa salad. I used about 5 ounces of spinach for the recipe. Have a great weekend and let me know if you have any other questions 🙂
Hi, I wanted to let you know that I made this to have with our Easter dinner yesterday and it was really delicious. Thanks for the recipe!
Husbands are funny when it comes to food conversations. I ask mine about things I’ve made when I want to laugh. But when I want brutal honesty, I ask my kids. This salad looks gorgeous and yummy and like something that needs to get in my tummy. Soon!
I love quinoa, and love all those Mediterranean flavors. On my way over to get your recipe now!
Oh me! I love a salad that’s just chocked full of stuff! So pretty and colorful too!
This looks so good and your husband makes me laugh! He’s trying to help, right? My hubby usually just tells me that it tasted healthy, which of course is no help at all.
He definitely has his heart in the right place. Classic mistake, though, trying to coax an in-depth food review out of a man…one of these days, I’ll remember boys just don’t react the same way to food as we women do 😉
This salad is right up my alley…love it!
What a great way to shake up quinoa! I love the big chunks of feta, olives and sun-dried tomatoes in this wholesome, colorful dish. Great recipe, Julia! Enjoy your weekend.
I am actually addicted to all your recipes. This looks fantastic! Healthy and filling 🙂
Heh heh. And then you tweet me asking for help and I tell you to write “eff it”. WOW we are super helpful people. 😉
This looks so fresh and healthy – the perfect dish for summer! I’m always on the hunt for new ways to use quinoa and can’t wait to try this. Thanks for sharing!
haha! floating on a yellow raft in the Mediterranean. I think that means you nailed this dish!
Bahahaha floating on a yellow raft. I want to go to there with this salad!
Me too! What are we doing? Let’s hop on a plane, stat!
At least you get words out of him. When I ask Josh, I get a “Well. Uh. Hmm. When did we eat that again?” 2 hours ago. We ate that literally two hours ago.
I definitely get that response too. Silly boys! 🙂
LOL “floating on a yellow raft”. So something my own manacle would say. Gotta love em, right?
Absolutely! They definitely add humor to life 🙂
Julia, this looks delicious! I love all Mediterranean flavors and especially in quinoa! YUM!