🥗💚😋 My Classic Italian House Salad is an EASY side salad recipe to serve with your favorite entree or alongside the main course! Made with common ingredients that you likely have already, it’s flexible and adaptable, so you can ADD anything else you have on hand! The simple vinaigrette is easy, light, and flavorful, but your favorite salad dressing also works.
My Go-To House Salad Recipe
Everyone needs an easy house salad recipe in their life! The type of simple salad recipe that uses common ingredients that you likely already have on hand in your produce crisper drawer.
Crisp Romaine lettuce, juicy tomatoes, carrots, cucumbers, shredded Parmesan, and crunchy croutons are a must. After that, I use whatever I have on hand since and am craving or need to use since this is a super flexible salad recipe.
It’s the salad you serve before or alongside weeknight dinners at home as a way to round things out and get some greenery and vegetables into your diet, or your family’s, and balance out your plate.
Ingredients and Notes
There’s a ton of flexibility in what ingredients you use. Here’s what I use in my Italian house salads, as well as ways to tweak the ingredients:
For the Salad:
- Romaine lettuce (or a lettuce blend, spring mix, or mix with a variety of lettuces including spinach, baby spinach, endive, arugula, butter lettuce, iceberg lettuce, radicchio, and so forth)
- Tomatoes (Beefsteak, heirloom, Roma, cherry tomatoes, grape tomatoes, yellow or orange tomatoes, etc.)
- Cucumber – I like to use English cucumbers or Persian cucumbers, because they have fewer seeds and thinner skin. Regular also work
- Carrots – Use whole carrots for the best taste, or save time with pre-shredded carrtos
- Red onions or shallots – White or yellow onions are also fine, if preferred
- Croutons, for garnishing – Homemade or store-bought
- Grated Parmesan cheese, for garnishing – Or, use another favorite shredded or grated cheese Pecorino, Romano, grated white cheddar, feta or blue cheese crumbles, cheddar cheese, or shredded blend/mix such as a “Mexican cheese blend” or “pizza cheese blend” or whatever looks good to you
For the Red Wine Vinaigrette:
- Extra virgin olive oil – I do not recommend substituting any other oil for the dressing
- Red wine vinegar – Or rice vinegar/rice wine vinegar, apple cider vinegar, champagne vinegar, balsamic vinegar, etc. but I am not a fan of basic white vinegar here. And see below that you can use equal parts lemon juice + vinegar rather than solely vinegar too
- Dijon mustard
- Honey – You can swap maple syrup or agave nectar
- Seasonings – Garlic powder, onion powder, dried oregano, salt, and pepper
Note: Scroll down to the recipe card section of the post for the ingredients with amounts included and for more complete directions.
How to Make a House Salad
It’s a near foregone conclusion that you’re going to be serving this salad alongside something else. Therefore, don’t obsess!
You can either:
- Add the lettuce torn or chopped into bite-sized pieces, and then all remaining ingredients on top of it, in a large bowl. I use this method for big family gatherings and we pass the bowl around family-style.
- OR add a handful of lettuce to individual plates, and top each with the remaining ingredients. I tend to prefer this method when I am serving it to my family because it’s one less big bowl to wash.
Then, top the simple side salad with the homemade vinaigrette and serve!
Tips for Making Vinaigrettes
Make sure you have a Mason jar with a lid or some sort of little jar that you can seal. An old mayonnaise jar, or jelly or jam jar works too. I never throw those out. Rewash, save, and repurpose!
Vinaigrettes and salad dressings in general, I find, are highly personal. My measurement guidelines are just that, a rough framework for you to use, but always add ingredients to your personal taste preferences, including more salt, pepper, garli,c or onion powder.
Adjusting the Flavor of the Vinaigrette
- Lemon lover? You can use equal parts vinegar + lemon juice. For today’s recipe, you would use 2 tablespoons red wine vinegar + 2 tablespoons lemon juice, rather than 4 tablespoons red wine vinegar for a lemony vinaigrette.
- Want it spicier? Add a pinch of red pepper flakes or even the tiniest pinch ever of cayenne pepper.
- Lacks pizzazz or oomph? Likely this is a fault of not enough salt. Add more, and don’t be shy! This is the most common error home cooks make is under-salting.
- Want it bolder? Add more garlic powder or minced garlic, and/or more onion powder.
- Have fresh herbs? Finely dice your fresh basil, fresh mint, fresh parsley, and add them. You can also use a blender like I do in the two basil vinaigrettes that I link below.
- Add more sweetener (honey, maple, agave, or a pinch of sugar) if you want to cut the pungentness of the vinegar. And/or if you used balsamic vinegar rather than red wine vinegar for example.
Classic House Salad FAQs
Of course! If you want to serve this as more than just a starter or side salad and want to it to be more of a meal, adding protein is the way to go. Chicken is an easy and obvious choice.
Store bought rotisserie chicken, Poached Chicken, Grilled Lemon Chicken, or 20-Minute Perfect Baked Chicken are all quick and easy options.
Feeling like shrimp? My easy 10 Minute Orange Chili Shrimp are ready in a flash.
And if you’re a bacon fan, Air Fryer Bacon is a fast way to prepare it before adding some bacon crumbles to your salad.
Yes of course! If you don’t want to make your own, by all means, crack open a bottle of Ranch, French, Blue Cheese, Caesar, Honey Mustard, or whatever dressing you enjoy or have on hand.
Yes you sure can. As written, using 1 head of Romaine lettuce or a similar amount of bagged lettuce, you can make about 4 to 6 small salads. You can easily adjust the yield by halving, doubling, tripling all the ingredients, as desired.
Storage Instructions
Salads are always best enjoyed when they’re freshly made. While you could assemble a salad up to 24 hours beforehand – say for a work or school lunch on the go – the closer you can assemble and then serve it, the better.
However, if you do have leftover homemade vinaigrette or homemade salad dressing, they tend to keep well in an airtight container or jar for up to 7 days in the refrigerator.
Note that the olive oil + honey or maple syrup will tend to firm up in the fridge (not harden fully like gravy for example) but take it out 30 minutes before you plan to dress your salad so you can shake and add it with ease. Otherwise a 5 second zap in the microwave can help!
What to Serve with a House Salad
Classic House Salad
Ingredients
Salad
- 1 head Romaine lettuce, washed and trimmed (or 12-ounce bag of Romaine)
- 1 large diced tomato, heirloom or similar, 2 diced Roma tomatoes, or 3/4 to 1 cup halved or sliced cherry/grape tomatoes
- ½ medium cucumber or English cucumber, sliced or diced small (I peel regular cucumbers but not English)
- ½ cup shredded carrots or about 1/2 cup small diced carrots, peeled
- ⅓ cup thinly sliced red onions, rinse under cold water to remove some of the ‘bite’
- Freshly grated Parmesan cheese, for garnishing to taste
- Croutons, for garnishing to taste (homemade or store bought)
Vinaigrette
- ½ cup olive oil
- ¼ cup red wine vinegar
- 1 to 2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
- 1 to 2 tablespoons honey, maple syrup, or agave nectar, or to taste
- 1 teaspoon garlic powder, or to taste
- 1 teaspoon onion powder, or to taste
- ½ teaspoon dried oregano, or to taste
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt, plus more to taste if desired
- ½ teaspoon freshly ground black pepper, plus more to taste if desired
Instructions
- Salad – To a large bowl (or individual plates), add the lettuce, and top with the remaining ingredients, as desired.
- Vinaigrette – To a small glass jar with a lid (Mason jar or an old and well-washed mayo/jam/jelly jar, etc.) add all the ingredients. Seal, shake, and taste. Tweak the flavor, as desired. Flavoring/Seasoning Tips – If it tastes at all "boring" or lacks pizzazz or oomph, that's generally a sign it needs more salt. Don't be afraid to add it (and generously), as desired. Likewise, don't be afraid to add more sweetener (or a pinch of granulated sugar) if it's overly "bitey" or potent. It's normal to need to add something sweet to balance the acidity of the vinegar.
- Once dressed, salad should be served immediately. Extra vinaigrette will last airtight in the fridge for at least 7 days. Remove it from the fridge about 30 minutes before shaking and using as the cold air in the fridge will cause it to be overly thick and hard to shake but it will loosen up at room temp.
Notes
- Basil Vinaigrette
- Another Basil Vinaigrette
- Strawberry Apple Cider Vinaigrette
- Cranberry Apple Cider Vinaigrette
- Warm German Potato Salad Vinaigrette
- Honey Apple Cider Vinaigrette
- Mexican Inspired Cumin Lime Vinaigrette
- Mediterranean Vinaigrette
- Homemade Tzatziki Sauce
- Homemade Chimichurri Sauce
- Balsamic Reduction and Glaze
- Homemade Buttermilk Ranch Dressing
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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