This easy green Italian salad antipasti platter makes a delicious vibrant centrepiece for lunchtime spread and is ideal for relaxed entertaining. Not so much a recipe as a guide to assembling your best ever salad in the green, white and red of the Italian flag.
Green Italian salad
I love to serve a big antipasti salad platter as a lunchtime centrepiece when guests come over. It’s inviting, it’s colourful, it’s easy and there’s something for everyone, just begging you to dive in to that Italian green salad and antipasti treats.
See also
- Pesto dressing is great with pizza and on all sorts of Italian salads
- Enjoy this robust and satisfying Italian pasta salad
- Deliciously easy, Italian rice salad is great for buffets
I could make up a green salad and serve the Italian meats and cheeses and olives on different plates, but a big, generous insalata mista is much more fun, makes a big impression on the table and doesn’t take up anything like as much space!
I prepare in advance and make my salad up just before serving. Choose a big shallow serving platter that will make an impact on the table, for a real wow factor. Fill it up with fresh green salad and then dot it with all those fabulous antipasti treats.
Completely adaptable to taste, season and availability, this Italian antipasto salad platter is the ultimate in fuss free entertaining.
Crucially, there is no fixed ‘recipe’ for my Italian green salad. It’s endlessly adaptable. I have listed a particular combination of ingredients that I had today, but you can change it around. I have given quantities for so just multiply it up for however many people you have to feed.
Just don’t go overboard and throw everything in every time; stick to 5 or 6 feature ingredients on top of the green salad.
Preparing in advance leaves you free to chat with your friends instead of toiling away in the kitchen while they wait. What could be better?
So this is my recipe or guide for a free and easy red white and green Italian salad, fresh and bright with all the colours of the Italian tricolor and all the brilliant bursts of flavour to make it a salad you’ll want to come back to again and again.
Getting ahead
The easiest way to prepare this salad is to do all the preparation before your guests arrive.
I like to allow 3–4 large leaves per person, and also some fine leaves like rocket (arugula). I wash and spin the leaves in my salad spinner, drain the water off and pop the salad spinner into the fridge. Chop the fresh vegetables (apart from the tomatoes and avocado, which are best cut at the last minute) and store in covered pots in the fridge.
If you want, you can grate the hard cheese now and keep it in the fridge, or you can grate it straight onto the salad when you come to assemble it.
Make up the salad dressing and you are all set. Just allow everything to come to room temperature from about half an hour before you want to throw the salad together. That way, the food will be perfect and you will still have time to look after your friends.
Why make green Italian salad
- easy and flexible but oh so impressive
- colourful and inviting for entertaining
- a relaxed way to serve
- full of flavour
Green Italian salad ingredients
- Salad leaves – rocket/arugula, spinach, lettuce, lollo rosso… whatever you love
- Tomatoes – little Italian cherry or plum tomatoes are tasty and convenient, or you can slice larger tomatoes
- Olives – a mix
- Avocado
- Cucumber
- Prosciutto – I think a sweet ham such as Prosciutto di san Danielle works well, or you can use Parma ham or other Italian salumi meats. Either way, it’s worth paying for the good stuff.
- Mozzarella – the little bite-sized pearls are ideal
- Red pepper – to keep the Italian flag theme!
- Basil – freshly ripped leaves. I keep a basil plant on my kitchen windowsill from spring through autumn
- Italian hard cheese – a tasty grana like Parmigiano Reggiano or Grana Padano – or a vegetarian version if required.
- Italian dressing – homemade is not compulsory but it is the best!
- Balsamic vinegar or drizzle (optional, not shown) – thick, sticky and full of flavour, you can use this in addition to the dressing or instead if you prefer.
How to make a green Italian salad platter – step by step
Before you start, read my step-by-step instructions, with photos, hints and tips so you can make this delicious antipasti salad platter perfectly every time.
Scroll down for the recipe card with quantities and more tips at the bottom of the page.
Step One – Choose a large, shallow, attractive bowl with plenty of space. Put the leaves, chopped cucumber and pepper in, and scatter half the grated parmesan over the top
Step Two – Toss the green salad so the cheese is lightly coating the ingredients. This adds a layer of delicious savoury umami flavour that will permeate the whole salad.
Step Three – Arrange the rest of the ingredients on top of the green salad base. Sprinkle over the remains of the grated cheese.
If you feel like a little fancy presentation, you can try your hand at prosciutto roses, rolling the ham into coils and pinching at the base.
Drizzle over a little balsamic vinegar (if using) and garnish with the fresh basil leaves.
Then, right before serving, drizzle with the dressing.
Enjoy immediately.
Serving suggestion
Serve this Italian green salad and antipasti platter simply with some delicious ciabatta or focaccia, or as part of a bigger grazing spread.
Variations
You really are only limited by your imagination, so mix and match. Your Italian green salad is perfect with any Italian deli treats, so treat my ingredients as suggestions rather than a fixed recipe.
- Change the meats. You can use Mortadella or bologna, or maybe try seafood such as garlic prawns, smoked salmon.
- Change the cheese. Cubes of a good Italian blue cheese would be delicious here – perhaps a meltingly soft gorgonzola dolce.
- Add all sorts of bottled antipasti (just make sure you drain them first). Artichokes, capers, mushrooms, gherkins, pickled courgettes… Sundried tomatoes are punchy enough to take the place of the ham in a vegetarian version of this salad, and homemade air fryer cherry tomatoes are fabulous.
- Add some more protein with some hard boiled eggs.
- I love fruit in a salad. A couple of perfectly ripe nectarines or figs are delicious paired with the salty ham and olives.
- Add more vegetables. Drained canned sweetcorn is easy and cooked, cooled green beans are delicious in your Italian salad.
Storage
This salad is best enjoyed as soon as it is assembled.
You can, however, clean, chop, drain and grate most of the ingredients in advance, assembling the salad and preparing the tomato and avocado at the last minute.
I frequently prepare lettuce in advance
Hints and tips
- Prepare everything in advance then assemble the salad at the last minute.
- Make sure all the ingredients are at room temperature – give them 30 minutes out of the fridge.
- Do not go mad and add everything or you will have a giant mishmash of ingredients all competing for attention. Once you have the base, addno more than 5 or 6 “deli” treats.
FAQs
Italian dressing is great, but you can use simple oil and balsamic vinegar or pesto salad dressing or all sorts of other favourite dressings, depending on personal taste and what suits your star ingredients.
Rucola – also known as arugula or rocket – is probably Italy’s favourite salad leaf, but lollo rosso, spinach, endives and lettuce are widely eaten too.
You can certainly grate your parmesan (or a veggie parmesan equivalent) ahead of time. I don’t recommend the stuff you actually buy ready grated. Neither the taste nor the texture is great.
Related recipes
- Tomato and mozzarella salad – simplicity itself, and an Italian classic
- Carrot salad – French bistro style
- Italian seasoning – delicious in dips, dressings, salads and more
- Italian dressing – perfect on all your salads
- Rocket salad – garnished with Parmesan
Green Italian Salad
Ingredients
- ½ head of lettuce
- 1 handful rocket or other herby leaves
- 50 cucumber
- ½ g bell pepper
- 25 g finely grated parmesan cheese
- ½ avocado
- 2 tbsp olives
- 6 cherry tomatoes
- 4 slices Italian ham
- ½ ball mozzarella (or half a bag of mini mozzarellas)
- 1 tbsp balsamic vinegar
- basil leaves
- 2 tbsp Italian dressing
Instructions
- Choose a large, shallow, attractive bowl with plenty of space. Put the leaves, chopped cucumber and pepper in, and scatter half the grated parmesan over the top.½ head of lettuce, 1 handful rocket or other herby leaves, 50 cucumber, ½ g bell pepper, 25 g finely grated parmesan cheese
- Toss the green salad so the cheese is lightly coating the ingredients. This adds a layer of delicious savoury umami flavour that will permeate the whole salad.
- Arrange the rest of the ingredients on top of the green salad base. Sprinkle over the remains of the grated cheese.½ avocado, 2 tbsp olives, 6 cherry tomatoes, 4 slices Italian ham, ½ ball mozzarella
- Drizzle over a little balsamic vinegar (if using) and garnish with the fresh basil leaves. Drizzle the Italian dressing over right before serving.1 tbsp balsamic vinegar, basil leaves, 2 tbsp Italian dressing
Notes
Storage
This salad is best enjoyed as soon as it is assembled. You can, however, clean, chop, drain and grate most of the ingredients in advance, assembling the salad and preparing the tomato and avocado at the last minute.Hints and tips
- Prepare everything in advance then assemble the salad at the last minute.
- Make sure all the ingredients are at room temperature – give them 30 minutes out of the fridge.
- Do not go mad and add everything or you will have a giant mishmash of ingredients all competing for attention. Once you have the base, add no more than 5 or 6 “deli” treats.
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