Dressy enough for Christmas dinner, but easy enough to make anytime, my simple arugula salad recipe is the type of basic recipe that I like to memorize and bust out when I need an easy side salad (think group vacations or last minute grocery runs) because I can always remember the ingredients. I’ve made a lot of arugula salads over the years, from a version with berries and goat cheese, to one with burrata and pistachios. But this arugula salad recipe is the simplest, and honestly, might be the best!
Why I Love Arugula
Arugula is a type of mustard green, which is why it tastes spicy! The level of peppery-ness varys a bit depending on where I buy it. The arugula I buy at the farmers market is legit spicy, whereas the arugula I buy in a clamshell at the grocery store is lightly peppery. Either way, this green has a kick, which means it’s easy to make a gourmet-tasting salad without many ingredients.
Arugula Salad Ingredients
- Arugula greens: The fresher the better!
- Parmesan cheese: Shave it off a hunk of Parm using a vegetable peeler for a restaurant-y look.
- Pine nuts: Toasted pine nuts to add a little texture to this salad, and make it fancy enough for your holiday table! Bonus: You can toast them way ahead of time.
- Mustard: This helps make the salad dressing a bit creamy.
- Olive oil: Extra virgin is best for salad dressings.
- Shallot: What makes French bistro salads so good? Minced shallots in the dressing, always. Now you know!
- Salt & pepper: Seasoning the salad with salt and pepper is a skip that so many home cooks forget! Add salt and pepper, like you would anything else.
How To Make Arugula Salad
- Toast the pine nuts. You can do this up to a week in advance.
- Make the dressing. This can also be done 4-5 days ahead of time! Just store it in the fridge until you’re ready to use it.
- Toss the salad.
- Dig in!
Variations + Swaps
- For a less peppery salad, use half spinach and half arugula.
- Use fresh lemon juice in place of the balsamic vinegar for a lighter, brighter dressing.
- Skip the honey if you want a more sharp flavor.
- Dijon mustard is a fine swap for the stone-ground, if that’s what you have.
- It’s fine to leave the pine nuts off, if you’re serving a crowd where you’re not sure about nut allergies.
- Use a different cheese! Crumbly feta or even fresh goat cheese would all work nicely in place of the Parm.
More Basic Salad Recipes
Dinner? Done.
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