Cottage Cheese Salad
on Jul 23, 2024, Updated Jan 26, 2025
This post may contain affiliate links. Please read our disclosure policy.
This cottage cheese salad is a triple threat: it’s no-cook, high protein, and comes together in under 10 minutes ⏲. If you’re looking for a nutritious, satisfying, fresh meal, let me introduce you to this incredible dish. A beautiful diced salad gets plated atop a thick bed of creamy cottage cheese for this winning 🏅 recipe. Finely dicing all the vegetables evenly takes a bit of extra effort (or no effort if you use a vegetable chopper) but you’ll be rewarded with a stunning presentation, and each bite will contain all the flavor and textures: juicy tomato 🍅, crispy cucumber 🥒, piquant red onion, salty olive 🫒, and creamy cottage cheese.
Why You’ll Love Cottage Cheese Salad
Lettuce-free salad lovers unite! 👊 There’s so much to love about a chopped salad: evenly cutting each vegetable makes for such a visually appealing presentation. It’s so satisfying to scoop up a fork-full and enjoy a little morsel of each ingredient. Serving the diced salad atop a big scoop of cottage cheese is a super easy way to incorporate lots of protein into the meal. I love this salad as is, but you could also eat it like a dip, and scoop up some cottage cheese plus salad onto tortilla or pita chips. You can make the diced salad ahead—up to 2 days in advance—and serve it with cottage cheese when you’re ready to enjoy it.
How to Prepare Cottage Cheese Salad
🔪 Using a food chopper, pass each vegetable through, one at a time, until you have a fine dice.
🧂 Then, after dicing everything, open up the chopper and add olive oil, lemon juice, and salt, then mix.
🍽️ Next, spread the cottage cheese onto the base of a serving plate.
🌿 Lastly, add the chopped salad on top of the cottage cheese and top it off with fresh herbs (if using). Enjoy!
Nonna’s Tip 🧀
Dairy-free? Try this chopped salad atop a big scoop of hummus for a delicious alternative to cheese. 🫘
Variations and Substitutions for Cottage Cheese Salad
- Enjoy this salad as a dip and serve with your favorite pita or tortilla chips.
- The olives and jalapeño are completely optional. Also, if you prefer other types of olives over kalamata, feel free to use them here: cured black olives, castelveltrano, and others all work well here. 🫒
- Use any crunchy veggies you love here. Other ingredients that work well: bell peppers 🫑, fennel, radishes, and more.
- Instead of cottage cheese, you can also try this recipe with full fat plain yogurt, labneh, ricotta cheese, or mashed feta. Dairy-free? Try this salad over a layer of hummus.
- Want to bump up the protein? Add a can of drained, rinsed chickpeas or some pre-cooked lentils.
Similar Recipes
Best Served With
- Take your cooking to the next level, by making homemade pita and serving the warm pockets alongside this salad.
- This is the perfect salad to serve alongside souvlaki (grilled skewers) 🍖: chicken, pork, or salmon.
- Crunchy, crusty rustic bread 🍞 is perfect for sopping up the delicious juices from this dish. Have you tried my super easy No Knead Bread?
- If no-cook meals, like this salad, are calling your name, then add to the table this no-cook Gazpacho, which highlights some of the best of summer ☀️ produce.
Common Questions
No problem! With a little patience and time, you can finely dice the ingredients with a knife and a cutting board.
Certainly, you can make the chopped salad two days ahead of time and store it in an airtight container in the fridge. However, do not plate with cottage cheese until you’re ready to eat.
Yes you certainly can, I am not dairy-free so you will have to experiment 🧪 However, hummus makes a delicious alternative to cottage cheese.
You can make the salad with any raw vegetable that you enjoy diced: radishes, bell pepper, spinach, carrots, and more will work here.
I get it, a lot of people don’t like olives. The dish needs a little briny salty flavor. Instead, you can replace the olives with pickled onions or pickled pepperoncini.
Cottage Cheese Salad
Ingredients
- 2 slices tomato
- ¼ cucumber, cut in half
- 1 slice onion, (one ring)
- 1 jalapeño, seeded and halved
- 8 kalamata olives , pitted
- 2 teaspoons olive oil, extra virgin
- ½ lemon, juiced
- 1 pinch salt, to taste
- 1 cup cottage cheese, 2%
- fresh herbs such as basil, oregano, or parsley, optional
Instructions
- Using a food chopper, pass each vegetable through, one at a time, until you have a fine dice. This includes the tomato, cucumber, onion, jalapeño, and olives.
- Note: make sure to cut the veggies into smaller pieces so they can easily pass through the food chopper. You can also take your time and cut everything into small cubes with a knife if you don't have a chopper at home.
- When everything is diced, open up the chopper and add olive oil, lemon juice, and salt and mix.
- Spread the cottage cheese onto the base of a serving plate.
- Add the chopped salad on top of the cottage cheese and top it off with fresh herbs (if using). Enjoy!
My Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I needed a quick and easy lunch idea, and this cottage cheese salad delivered! So fresh, so flavorful, and packed with protein. Love it!
Easy. Delicious. High in protein. Loved it!!!
Thanks Rosanne 💕
This is amazing. Love all your recipes.
Simple easy and healthy
Aww thank you 🫶