Description

Easy Greek chickpea salad with shrimp is perfect for summertime meal-prep, or bringing to pot-lucks. It’s bursting with a variety of veggies, and sweet shrimp, all with a tangy red wine vinaigrette. So good!

Ingredients

Units Scale

Greek Dressing

1/2 cup red wine vinegar
1/2 cup extra virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon Greek seasoning (See notes)
2 teaspoons kosher salt
2 cloves garlic, minced
2 tablespoons Dijon mustard
3 tablespoons honey

Shrimp

1 pound peeled, and deveined shrimp (can be cooked from frozen, or defrosted – see directions)
1 tablespoon kosher salt

Salad

2 15 ounce cans chickpeas, drained and rinsed (or, 4 cups cooked chickpeas)
3 mini cucumbers, sliced (or, 1 English cucumber)
1 sweet bell pepper, chopped (could use red, yellow, or orange)
10 ounces cherry, or grape tomatoes, sliced
1/3 to 1/2 cup red onion, chopped
1/2 cup pitted kalamata olives, sliced in half
4 ounce can sliced black olives, drained (could sub with more kalamata olives, if preferred)
15 ounce can of quartered artichoke hearts, drained
6 ounces feta cheese, crumbled, or cubed (see notes)

Optional Garnishes

Fresh herbs such as: dill, oregano, parsley
Extra feta cheese, freshly crumbled

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Instructions

Boil water: Bring a medium pot of water to a boil to cook the shrimp. Have your shrimp ready to go. You can either use frozen shrimp, or fresh shrimp/frozen shrimp that’s been deforested – just make sure they’re shelled, and de-veined.
Make the Greek dressing: While the water is coming to a boil grab a large mixing bowl. Whisk together all of the ingredients for the Greek dressing – the red wine vinegar, olive oil, Greek seasoning, kosher salt, garlic, Dijon mustard, honey – until well combined. Taste and adjust as needed, keeping in mind that this dressing is supposed to be on the tangier side. Remember to keep an eye on the pot of water coming to a boil while you’re making your dressing.
Prepare the ice bath: Once the water has almost come to a boil, add 2 cups of ice to a medium sized mixing bowl, then, fill up the bowl with cold water. This will stop the cooking of the shrimp, and allow it to cool.
Cook the shrimp: Meanwhile, once the water for the shrimp has reached a boil, add the 1 tablespoon of kosher salt to the pot of water. Then, add the shrimp, giving it a stir. If your shrimp is frozen, cook it for 3 minutes, or until it curls up in on itself, and turns pink. If it’s not frozen, cook for 30 seconds to 1 minute, or until the shrimp curls up and turns pink – this happens fast with fresh shrimp, so don’t walk away. Once the shrimp has cooked, use a slotted spoon to transfer it to the ice bath.
Allow the shrimp to cool: Allow the shrimp to cool in the ice batch for 5 minutes, this allows the shrimp to stop cooking completely, and it helps to firm it up giving it a nice texture. Don’t skip.
Chop the veggies: While the shrimp is chilling in it’s ice bath. Chop all the veggies as instructed above, and add them to the bowl with the Greek dressing – including the drained and rinsed chickpeas, kalamata olives, black olives, artichoke hearts, and crumbled feta cheese.
Drain the shrimp: Once 5 minutes are up, drain the shrimp from it’s ice bath – removing any pieces of ice that didn’t melt. Add the shrimp to the mixing bowl along with the veggies.
Toss: Gently toss everything together using tongs or two salad forks, until everything is coated in the dressing.
Chill: You can serve this salad right away, but it is best when it has chilled for at least two hours, or up to 6 hours. This makes it a great salad for meal prep, or serving at parties.
To serve: Give the salad another toss, especially if it has chilled in the fridge, and portion out into serving bowls – or, transfer to one large serving bowl for people to help themselves. I like to top the salad with extra crumbled feta cheese, and fresh herbs, such as parsley, dill, and/or oregano. See notes for leftovers.

Notes

Greek seasoning – You can use store bought Greek seasoning – make sure it’s unsalted. I love to make my own Greek seasoning, I always have it on hand. I use this Greek seasoning recipe, from Inspired Eats.

Feta cheese – I recommend getting a block of feta cheese and crumbling it yourself, when possible. It has so much more flavor than the pre-crumbled stuff.

vegetarian option – omit the shrimp and just rely on the chickpeas as your source of protein. If you want, you could even add a third can of chickpeas.

Dairy free option – omit the feta cheese. Try adding some capers to replace that tangy, salty bite.

Side option – if you want to serve this as a side salad instead of an entrée salad, simply omit the shrimp.

Leftovers/meal prep – This salad is great leftover, it lasts in the fridge for up to 3 days. The veggies get sort of “pickled” in the dressing, yum. However, the tomatoes do get a little soft and mushy. This didn’t bother my husband, but it wasn’t my favorite. If you’re making this a few days in advance, or using it as a meal prep salad, you can easily leave the tomatoes out until just before serving, if you don’t want them getting soggy. Either way, it’s really good leftover.