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For years, I thought salads had to look a certain way—bland iceberg lettuce, salty croutons, and a thick, creamy dressing. I ate them… but I didn’t love them. That all changed when I realized how fresh, vibrant, and satisfying salads can actually be.
This strawberry mixed greens salad is one of my favorites. It’s all about the balance—crisp greens, sweet fruit, creamy avocado, and that bright strawberry basil vinaigrette that brings everything to life. This is the kind of salad you’ll actually crave. Enjoy!
Table of Contents
What is a Mixed Greens Salad?
A mixed green salad is a simple salad made with a variety of leafy greens—like spring mix, spinach, arugula, or lettuce—topped with fresh ingredients and a dressing. It’s known for being light, flexible, and easy to customize based on what you have on hand.
This recipe stands out because it’s more balanced and satisfying—with fruit, healthy fats, crunch, and a homemade strawberry basil dressing that adds fresh, vibrant flavor.
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How to Make Mixed Greens Salad
This mixed greens salad recipe is filled with these greens, plus tangy green apple, creamy avocado, and crunchy almonds. Seriously, this salad is the perfect meal when your sweet tooth comes calling and you’re trying to eat healthy.
1. Wash and dry greens
A recent study done by Consumer Reports says that we should all be washing any produce that comes into our cooking spaces, whether “pre-washed”, organic or otherwise. This is because even those mixed greens carefully washed by well meaning producers can still contain contaminants from E. coli, chemicals and more.
2. Chop apples, avocado and cucumber
I like to chop them all into bite-size pieces (the smaller, the better).
3. Make the Strawberry viniagarette
Combine dressing ingredients in a high-speed blender or food processor and puree into the best dressing you’ve ever had with mixed greens.
4. prepare the plate
Add the mixed greens first, and then toppings to the plate. Drizzle dressing on top and enjoy!
Make-Ahead Tips
If you want this salad for work, prep it all in a mason jar. It’s seriously so easy! Simply layer the ingredients in the mason jar. Keep the strawberry dressing in a separate container until time to eat. When you’re ready to eat, pour the dressing on top, give the mason jar a good shake, and enjoy!
Strawberry Mixed Greens Salad
Ingredients
- 4 cup spring mix greens loosely packed
- 1 cucumber thinly sliced
- 1 green apple diced
- 1 avocado sliced
- ¼ cup sliced almonds
Dressing
- 1 cup strawberries diced
- 6 fresh basil fresh, roughly chopped
- 2 tbsp extra-virgin olive oil
- 4 tsp lemon juice
- 2 tsp pure maple syrup
- pinch sea salt, unrefined
- pinch black pepper, ground ground, to taste
Instructions
- Arrange salad ingredients on plates.
- Puree the dressing ingredients in a blender or food processor. Taste and add more salt and pepper, if needed.
- Drizzle some of the dressing over salad (you may not need all of it). Eat immediately.
Notes
- Swap mixed greens with the leafy greens of your choice.
- Oil-free? Omit the olive oil. It’ll still be delicious and less caloric.
- Lemon Vinaigrette would also be delicious on this recipe.
- Add the nuts or seeds of your choice for more healthy fats + protein.
Nutrition
Did you make this recipe?
Leave a review for a chance to win signed copies of my cookbooks!Common Questions
Yes! If you have a favorite dressing, feel free to swap out my Strawberry Vinaigrette. Yet I do encourage you to make it one time like this because it’s out-of-this-world delicious!
You sure can. You can swap it for any leafy green you prefer or have on hand. You might check out our Leafy Greens Guide for more inspiration.
In all my salads, I try and use some sorta nuts, seeds or protein to help me stay full. A salad is typically a meal for me, which means it needs a variety of fiber, healthy fats, protein and carbs to keep me full until the next meal.
This dressing was very tasty but I did miss not having a source of much protein besides just a few almonds. It was also overall a little too sweet for me with the apple and strawberry dressing.
This salad has amazing. Did not disappoint. Flavorful, yet light. Love the dressing. Definitely going into my recipe book!
Both me and Hubby enjoyed this salad as a side dish. The dressing totally elevated everything! Liked the different textures(crunch of the apple and creaminess of the avocado).
This was fabulous! My whole fam loved it. I didn’t have almonds, so subbed toasted pecans. Delicious! A friend said she uses pine nuts, which sounded interesting. I saw one reviewer found the dressing meh. Mine was very bright, but I got THE BEST, sweetest strawberries from Sprouts and fresh lemons from our backyard, so I am sure that made it great. I also skipped the maple syrup. I just didn’t feel it would add anything to this.
Pecans would be super yummy in this recipe!
This salad was easy to make. Just a couple of things I can not have on both salad and dressing. No apple and maple syrup with out these two things both came out yummy. Dressing was good. I will make it again. My avocado was not ready I substituted it with tomatoes. I can not have apple so I put a couple of fresh strawberries instead. Also it was very filling.
Best part of it is I know I am eating healthy and I out create things I can not have.
I want to post photo sorry don’t know how yet. 🙂
Love the dressing!
This recipe I love so much – I have made it for the past 3 days! Started over the weekend and it is so fresh and tasty. I added a chicken breast for more protein.
This recipe I love so much – I have made it for the past 3 days! Started over the weekend and it is so fresh and tasty. I added a chicken breast for more protein.
The strawberry dressing was delicious.
I have to be honest, I wasn’t sure what to expect with these ingredients, but it was SO delicious! I’ll be keeping this recipe for sure.
Probably the best-tasting salad that I have ever created. Perfect for luncheon with friends.
Loved this salad, used only spinach as my base. The dressing was the best. Since I normally use a bottled raspberry vinaigrette the home made was a nice change, very easy to throw together.
I loved this salad! I did make a couple of tweaks to ours but it was much more filling than I expected!!
Let me start by saying my salads are basic and is generally the base of this salad. What made this salad absolutely delicious was the dressing. It was light and delicious, a dressing I would never have chosen but so glad I did. This is added to my salad arsenal.
I loved the fresh flavor combos in this salad! The dressing was literally “lick the blender clean”! This will be in our lunch rotation for sure!
Love it, glad you enjoyed it.
So refreshing and good.
What a refreshing salad! I added microgreens to add texture, color and pack an extra punch of antioxidants. I also tweaked the dressing a bit by adding 1 tbsp of champagne vinegar and substituting agave for the maple syrup. I added about 1/4 c strawberries quartered to the salad to visually compliment the dressing. All in all it was a hit, can’t wait to try more.
We are more the savory kind of family so it was fun to try a dressing a bit sweeter but it probably will not be a standard fare….but I love the idea of incorporating anti-inflammatory ingredients such as berries into a dressing. Thank you, Jen for all the noodling you must do to create very cool recipes. I loved your soup challenge, too!
Nancy/Salado/Texas
The dressing was great. It was light and tangy with a hint of sweetness.
Not our fave. Maybe slicing some strawberries into the salad would have perked it up? Not impressed with the dressing…it wasn’t that sweet it wasn’t that sour…it was just bleh. Maybe I’ll add some basalmic vinegar or raspberry vinegar next time and see what that does. Something needs tweaking.
I totally understand. Sometimes it all depends on the sweetness of your strawberries.
This dressing was amazing, will be kept on my must have again list! Great tastes all around.