Watermelon and Feta Salad

This refreshing recipe for Watermelon and Feta Salad easily comes together in less than 30 minutes and is the perfect summertime dish. The combination of sweet, juicy, salty and tangy ingredients makes it entirely addictive.

The flavor combination of sweet watermelon with salty cheese and onions may seem unusual, but in fact, it makes for an incredibly delicious and refreshing sweet and savory dish that's just perfect on a hot summer day. So make sure to add this easy watermelon Feta salad to your next summer meal, it will surely be a big hit!

How to Make it

This is a simple salad requiring only a handful of ingredients, no cooking and less than half an hour to prepare. This watermelon feta salad recipe is adapted from Nigella Lawson's Watermelon, Feta and Black Olive Salad.

Here's an overview of the main ingredients, please see the recipe card at the end of the post for ingredient amounts and full directions.

Ingredients Overview:

• Watermelon. You'll need a ripe watermelon for the best flavor. I prefer to use seedless watermelon to avoir having to remove the seeds.
• Greek Feta cheese
• Red onion. If you don't enjoy the taste of raw onions or find them too overpowering you could use black olives instead, their salty and briny taste works really well in this salad.
• Fresh mint: Fresh mint adds freshness to this plate, but if you don't have any on hand you could use fresh basil leaves, though the taste won't be the same.
• Fresh lime juice
• Extra-virgin olive oil

Steps Overview:

It's best to prepare this watermelon salad recipe shortly before you plan on serving it. To mellow out the sharp flavour of the red onion slices, Nigella suggests steeping them in the lime juice as you prepare the salad. You'll then use the lime juice to make the salad dressing. 

1. Slice the onion in thin slices and add them to small bowl with the lime juice.
2. Cube the chilled watermelon and feta cheese.
3. In a large bowl, combine the watermelon cubes, feta cheese, red onions and mint leaves in a bowl.
4. Add olive oil to the lime juice that was used to steep the red onions.
5. Top watermelon salad with the dressing, season with black pepper, toss and serve.

Possible Variations:

• Add a peppery kick to the salad by incorporation arugula leaves.
• Add crunchy cucumbers.
• If you like things spicy, a bit of diced jalapeño adds heat to this salad and goes fantastically well with the cool watermelon.
• For a vegan watermelon salad, you can leave the Feta cheese out or use an alternative salty vegan cheese that crumbles. 

Watermelon and Feta Skewers

You could also use this recipe to make an appetizer in the form of watermelon and feta skewers.

After tossing the salad with the dressing, simply thread a chunk of watermelon followed by a mint or basil leaf and a cube of salty feta and repeat.

The skewers look really pretty but it does take some time to thread them.

Serving Suggestions

Serve this refreshing watermelon feta salad at a summer bbq as a tasty side dish to grilled Chicken Shawarma Kebabs, shrimp, fish, beef, or pork. It's also delicious with these Kafta Kebabs.

Storage Instructions

Note that this watermelon feta and mint salad is best consumed shortly after assembling it and it really doesn't keep well so it's best to make just what you need. 

Enjoy!

More Summer Salads to Enjoy

• Fattoush Salad
• Grilled Shrimp Salad
• Lebanese Tabbouleh
• Strawberry Spinach Salad
• Blueberry Spinach Salad
• Greek Salad with Grilled Chicken

This post was originally published on July 11, 2015. It has been updated with new content. Recipe remains unchanged.

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