Just the title of this recipe gets me excitedโpizza night salad ๐ . You already know: this is a veg-centric side that goes well with, yep, pizza! Itโs briny, vinegar-y, salty, sweet, crisp, and surprisingly hearty on its own. In my opinion this is the ultimate green salad in general. Whether weโre ordering takeout or making the pie at home, I almost always get a salad involved when pizzaโs on the table. I just like something fresh and crisp to contrast. My take on a vegan caesar salad is also a great option!
The most key component of this salad is a homemade red wine vinegar dressing with fresh thyme. This dressing has a lot going on! Garlic, fresh thyme (itโs incredible here), Tamari for depth, a dollop of vegan mayonnaise to give it more body, and a splash of salty/spicy pepperoncini brine. We simply shake it up in a jar! The dressing hangs more on the acidic side because that is my personal preference.
The rest of this pizza night salad just comes together in a couple bowls and on your cutting board. Another really important thing to take note of: try to cut the greens and vegetables everything nice and fine. That way you get a little bit of everything in every single bite. Itโs almost like a salad within a salad!
The chickpeas give this dish an abundant and substantial feel. I give lots of tips and substitution recommendations in the notes of the recipe itself, just in case you canโt find every single thing at the store.
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Pizza Night Salad
Ingredients
Red Wine Vinegar & Thyme Dressing
- ยผ cup red wine vinegar
- 1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves, minced
- 1 tablespoon pepperoncini pepper brine
- 1 tablespoon vegan mayonnaise
- 2-3 teaspoons agave nectar/fine sugar/honey
- ยฝ teaspoon Dijon mustard
- ยฝ teaspoon Tamari soy sauce
- 1 clove garlic, finely minced with a Microplane
- sea salt and ground black pepper, to taste
- 7 tablespoons olive oil
Salad
- 1 cup cooked chickpeas
- 1 cup cherry tomatoes, cut into quarters
- ยฝ medium red onion, small dice (about ยพ cup diced red onion)
- ยฝ English cucumber, small dice (about 1 cup diced cucumber)
- ยฝ cup pepperoncini peppers, stems removed and chopped fine
- ยฝ cup pitted olives, chopped fine
- 2 sun dried tomatoes packed in oil, minced (about โ cup minced sun dried tomato)
- 2 romaine hearts, finely shredded (about 5-6 cups shredded romaine)
- 1 small head radicchio, finely shredded (about 2-3 cups shredded radicchio)
- vegan "parmesan", for serving (optional)
Notes
- I recommend a milder-tasting olive oil for the dressing here. Save your robust and peppery olive oil for something extra special!
- I used chopped up Cerignola olivesโany pitted olives that you love are great.
- My vegan โparmesanโ recipe can be found here.
Instructions
- Make the dressing. In a sealable jar, combine the red wine vinegar, thyme, pepperoncini pepper brine, vegan mayonnaise, agave nectar, Dijon mustard, Tamari, garlic, salt, and pepper. Seal the lid on top of the jar and give it a good shake. Open up the jar and add the olive oil. Seal the lid back on and give it another shake. Set aside.
- In a medium bowl, combine the chickpeas, cherry tomatoes, red onion, cucumber, pepperoncini peppers, olives, and sun dried tomatoes. Season this mixture with salt and pepper and toss with 3 tablespoons of the dressing.
- Add the romaine, radicchio, and remaining dressing to a large serving bowl. Season with salt and pepper. Add ยฝ of the chickpea and vegetable mixture and toss to combine. Top the salad with the remaining chickpea and vegetable mixture, extra black pepper, and vegan "parmesan" if you like. Serve immediately.
The first time I made this salad I knew it would be on our rotation. When I take this to a gathering itโs always a hit. Since Iโm gluten-free and dairy-free, I just add a little pepperoni in this salad and it is my pizza. Such a healthy, yummy option!
This recipe is a staple at our house. We make it every time we order pizza and everyone loves it so much!
TRULY one of our favourite salads ever. This one is on rotation very regularly at our house and is fantastic with and without pizza.
Made this salad recipe for a dinner party and everyone LOVED it, even the kids enjoyed it. The texture is spot on with tons of flavor and super simple to make. This will be a new staple in our house, love it!
As a compromise between the vegans and omnivores for Christmas dinner, we went with Pizza. Parents made dessert and we brought this salad and it tastes as great as it looks!! We couldnโt wait to eat it!! Itโs more oil than weโre used to eating, but it was Christmas! Also, since weโre not olive fans, we subbed capers 1:1, no probs! We unfortunately didnโt have the vegan Parm and left that out, but I can definitely tell that it would have been fantastic here. Thank you so much for adding to our Christmas pizza night with this great recipe!!!
Happy New Year! Me again. After finishing the Christmas salad, which was delish, just wanted to mention that just the 2 of us in our household had to have it again for New Years today and we used up some vegan Bleu cheese instead of parm since we happened to have it and hit it with some black salt for an eggy flavor and itโs now officially my favorite. Thanks again!
Love the sound of this with vegan bleu cheese! Happy new year, Christy!
-L
This salad was so good! Great combo of flavors. Absolutely perfect for pizza night.
This salad is amazing! I made it for my meat-loving family, and it was a big hit. I just prepped it for the week, and Iโm really looking forward to enjoying it for dinner over the next few days.
Delicious! This recipe popped up on my Pinterest feed, and the picture looked fantastic. I am so glad I took a chance and made it for dinner, this will definitely go into my file as a salad to make again. I didnโt have it with pizza, it was a meal all on itโs own. Thank you for sharing!
This salad dressing is divine!
This is probably the best salad I have ever had โ I binged on it to the point of a serious stomach ache!
The kids (6, 7) loved it and so did the grown-ups โ none of us are into dressing so I tried a little just for the review, and ate the rest without it. This salad is incredible and I will be making it again this week. And maybe the next week. And the week after thatโฆ
I did have to sub the fancy lettuces for regular old iceberg due to availability in the area, but the salad still slaps so hard. Iโll add more protein to it to make a whole meal of it next time.
Perfect salad for family pizza night!
Try making this with roasted or grilled broccoli instead of romaine if you want a different kind of salad. Delicious! Iโve made a number of swaps, additions, and omissions and itโs great every time. You canโt go wrong with this one, itโs definitely in regular rotation at our house.
Can you just explain what you mean by โcookedโ chickpeas? I donโt see any notes on this. Do you just recommend that theyโre oven roasted a bit before putting in the salad? Hoping to make this week for my bookclub.
Hi Kathryn!
By cooked I mean regular chickpeas in a can! No need to roast in the oven. I always say โcookedโ so as not to confuse with dried ones. Hopefully that clarifies, but do let me know if you have any more questions.
-L
I make salads almost every day and was looking to make a different style of salad with homemade deep dish pizza, something with a touch more acid like the salads served with pizza at Chicago area restaurants while I was growing up,
I made this salad using the pickled sweet banana peppers that I had on hand and we enjoyed it very much. I usually use oregano with mint or oregano with marjoram in salad dressing, so using thyme was a nice change of pace too.
Delicious! Hearty enough to stand alone. I make this for my oldest who is a vegetarian, chop up some optional chicken for the meat eaters and everyone is happy! Thank you for the recipe!
So glad youโre enjoying it Heidi! :)
-L
My new favorite salad. I have made this multiple times over the past few months. Great for pizza night, great for leftover the next day, itโs just so delicious!
Iโve made this salad three times in the last week. So yummy with pasta, lasagna or pizza!
So glad that youโre enjoying it, Tyra!
-L
Best salad Iโve ever had!!!!!
Love this salad and dressing! Crowd pleaser! Served with a pasta dish and looking forward to a pizza night! :-)
This is so delicious! You are right, itโs perfect for pizza night. I will 100% be keeping this recipe handily. Yum yum.
So glad that you enjoyed Amanda! Thanks for leaving this review :)
-L
Love this recipe and have made it a few times! It is a winner.
So tasty! I added a cup of cooked quinoa and turned this into a full on dinner salad. Super satisfying.
This is wonderful and happily very easy to make. The dressing is SO good. Iโve made it a few times now, a couple of those times without a few ingredients (no vegan mayonnaise, agave nectar or brine) and itโs still amazing. Love it so much!
Made this tonight and it was amazing. Used purple cabbage instead of radicchio and only used half.Added marinated cubed tofu for protein. Definitely keep this dressing on hand. So good!
My new favorite salad! I used Tofutti sour cream in place of the mayo in the dressing and cut the radicchio down to about 2/3 of the amount suggested, and loved the result. Something about slicing salad greens finely makes me feel like Iโm eating in a fancy chopped salad joint that charges $13 a bowl. Briny and fresh, this went perfectly with vegan butternut squash risotto :)
This one is entering the rotation for when I need a veggie break without weeping into my wilted kale. There is so much amped up flavor, and itโs easily turned into a main with some big croutons or avocado slices added. The dressingโs sweetness can be modified depending on how bright your tomatoes or radicchio are, and you can make this into a โfridge dumpโ by tossing in whatever veg you need to use up โฆ I loved it with carrot strips, walnuts, and leftover roasted zucchini. It keeps well if you separate the leaves from the โwetโ elements like cuke/tomatoes/chickpeas and perhaps pickle the red onions so they donโt get too funky in the fridge over a few days. Itโs a lot of labor; I probably wouldnโt be making this AND a pizza (store bought it is!), but itโs just SO GOOD that itโs worth it.
Made this for some non-veg relatives and they devoured it. Will definitely be making this on repeat!
This is truly the perfect pizza night salad, so reminiscent of my childhood but leveled up with so many delicious ingredients. Chefโs kiss! Make this!
Do yourself a favor and make this.
youn cant make this shit up!! so good with my pasta- ate more of the salat. thank you master.
There are a lot of different tastes at my office and I was charged with making a salad for a pizza birthday party. I loosely followed this recipe and it was a big hit. Thank you Laura Wright!
Excellent salad Laura! Thanks. Really loved the dressing. We ate so much salad we decided to delay the pizza until tomorrow!
makes a huge batch, id half it next time, but delicious!
I really enjoyed this. I used red cabbage for radicchio. Iโm using the leftover dressing on some shredded cabbage today for lunch.
Excellent salad! Couldnโt find radicchio at my corner store so subbed cabbage. Also threw in some wilting broccoli and some random nuts for crunch. Delicious! Exactly the salad I want to eat with pizza.
Great salad! Thank you so much for the recipe. I have actually loved every recipe of yours that I have tried. Your book is very good too!
Everything I was hoping this salad would be! Tangy, salty, so much flavor. Came together pretty quickly too. Highly recommend!!!
Just had this at dinner and it was SO good. My 6 year old just had three servings (no pepperoncini in hers but the brine was in dressing). Really delicious
Loved this! Best salad Iโve had in a long time. Will be making frequently.
This salad is SO GOOD! When I first saw the post on Instagram I somehow internalized it as โpizza saladโ instead of โpizza night saladโ, so all I could think of was how to make it more pizza-like. I added diced pepperoni and served it with garlic knots! I made a few tweaks to the add-ins based on my familyโs preferences and also left a few things in separate bowls so people could add what they wanted. The dressing is so zippy and fresh (that fresh thyme REALLY amps it up!!) and overall the salad is just delicious and fun! I will make this again and again โ itโs my new favorite salad! Thank you for such a great recipe!
We loved this salad! Made it last night with the cheesy barley and broccoli and it was the perfect combo! Loved all the vinegary components, especially the pepperoncini brine in the dressing. Also loved how everything was chopped small โ so much flavor in one bite!
Made this along with your recipe for mushroom meatballs in marinara and your butternut/pesto cream lasagne, all for a wee birthday dinner party last night. Delicious! The flavours all worked beautifully together and were enjoyed by everyone. Salad was good today for lunch (was dressed yesterday). Thanks for the wonderful recipes!
I am in love with this salad. I couldnโt help repeated audible โmmmโs while eating this. Iโd say the fresh thyme and pepperoncini brine are the MVPs of the dressing. Thanks, Laura! OUTSTANDING!!!
I LOVE this idea! I am also someone who has to have a salad with pretty much every meal. The pepperoncini sounds bomb in here. Making this asap!!