A salad that sends you looking for something else to eat at three has not taken care of lunch. Jennifer Aniston salad starts with quinoa and chickpeas, then adds feta and pistachios, so you get more than a bowl of vegetables with dressing.
One pot of quinoa and one jar of dressing make six 1-cup portions. Do the work once, and lunch is already in the refrigerator when you do not have time to stop and make it.
What Is Actually In The Bowl
Jennifer Aniston has said that this was not the salad she ate while filming Friends. The story was corrected, but the name stayed with the quinoa salad that had already gone viral.
This version of the Jennifer Aniston Salad is a chilled grain salad, not a leafy one. Cooked quinoa is the base, and everything else is cut small enough that a forkful gets some of each: chickpeas, cucumber, red onion, pistachios, feta, parsley and mint, all of it turned through a lemon and olive oil dressing.
It eats like a meal instead of a side. Nothing in it wilts, because there is no lettuce to wilt.
Keep Everything Small Enough For One Forkful
Quinoa is small, and the cucumber, onion and pistachios need to fit beside it. Large pieces leave you with one mouthful of onion followed by another that is mostly grain.
- Dice the cucumber and red onion small and keep the pieces fairly even. The onion stays raw, so taking the time to dice it properly prevents a large piece from taking over a forkful.
- Chop the pistachios rather than leaving them whole. Buy shelled, roasted pistachios from the start so you are not cleaning bits of shell off the cutting board before you can chop. Lightly salted ones work well here.
- Use a sharp knife for the parsley and mint. A food processor can crush the herbs and leave them wet, while gentle chopping keeps the pieces separate enough to spread through the quinoa.
- Add the chickpeas, cucumber, onion, pistachios, feta and herbs only after the quinoa is cold. Then make the dressing before deciding whether you are serving the entire bowl or portioning it for later.
Optional: Soak The Red Onion
The red onion is the one thing in here that can take over the bowl. Nothing gets cooked after the quinoa, so it goes in raw and stays raw.
Ten minutes in cold water takes the bite out of it. Dice it first, then drain it and pat it dry before it goes in with everything else.
Shake The Dressing In A Jar
Lemon juice and olive oil separate quickly in a bowl. Shaking them in a lidded jar with the honey, salt and pepper brings the dressing together without requiring a whisk or another mixing bowl.
The dressing is the strongest part of this recipe. It tastes simple and fresh, and I use it on an ordinary lettuce salad too.
If you do not have a jar, whisk the dressing in a small bowl. Either way, mix it again immediately before adding it to the salad because the oil and lemon begin separating as they sit.
What happens next depends on when you plan to eat the six servings.
Make It Sunday, Eat It Through The Week
The quinoa has to be completely cold before anything else joins it, so this starts the day before the week does. Warm quinoa wilts the parsley and the mint.
From there it goes into containers instead of a bowl. The quinoa, chickpeas, onion, feta and herbs are all fine sitting together.
Do not freeze the assembled salad because the cucumber and herbs will lose their texture. Cooked quinoa can be frozen on its own, thawed overnight in the refrigerator and used for a fresh batch.
The cucumber and the pistachios are the two that do not keep as long. The cucumber softens and the pistachios lose their crunch, so I leave both out of the containers and add them the morning I am eating that one.
The dressing goes in its own jar and onto the portion, not the batch. Dressing the whole batch on Sunday means every container after the first has been sitting in lemon juice for days.
Chop the cucumber the night before you eat it, not on Sunday.
Serve the salad slightly chilled or let it lose some of its refrigerator chill before eating. It does not need to be reheated.
Eating the Salad Right Away
If you are serving the salad now, follow the recipe card through the final step. Pour the dressing over the full bowl and toss gently until the quinoa and chickpeas are evenly coated.
Taste it before transferring it to the serving bowl so you can adjust the salt and pepper if needed.
Changing The Grain, Nuts Or Cheese
- Bulgur wheat and couscous can replace the quinoa without changing the rest of the salad. Cook either one according to its package directions and use 3 cups of the cooked grain.
- Chicken broth can replace the vegetable stock if you do not need the salad to remain vegetarian. Water also works, although the quinoa will have a more neutral taste.
- If shelled pistachios are unavailable or too expensive, use chopped cashews or almonds. Both give you the crunch the salad needs without changing how it is assembled.
- Crumbled goat cheese can replace the feta. Goat cheese is milder and creamier, while feta gives the finished salad more salt. Whichever one you choose, keep the full amount. Cutting the cheese in half leaves it buried under the quinoa and herbs.
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Jennifer Aniston Salad
Ingredients
- 2 cups vegetable stock
- 1 cup quinoa
- 16 ounces chickpeas, rinsed and drained (also known as garbanzo beans)
- 1 cup cucumber, small diced (english or hot house cucumbers used)
- 1/2 small red onion, diced
- 1/2 cup shelled & roasted pistachios, chopped
- 1 cup crumbled feta cheese
- 1/2 cup chopped fresh parsley loosely packed
- 3 tablespoons chopped fresh mint
- ⅓ cup fresh squeezed lemon juice
- ⅓ cup olive oil, extra virgin
- 1 tablespoon honey
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
Instructions
- To a medium sized (2-3 quart) saucepan bring the vegetable stock to a boil over medium-high heat. Add the quinoa and stir. Add the lid and reduce the heat to low. Cook quinoa for 15 minutes.
- Remove the saucepan from the heat. Allow the quinoa to sit undisturbed, with the lid still on the saucepan, for 5 minutes.
- Remove the lid and fluff the quinoa with a fork. Transfer the fluffed quinoa to a large bowl and allow to cool to room temperature. Once cooled, cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate for a minimum of 2 hours, up to overnight, or until the quinoa is completely chilled.
- Once the quinoa has chilled, add t large bowl the chickpeas, diced cucumber, diced red onion, pistachio nuts, feta cheese crumbles, fresh parsley and fresh mint. Set aside.
- To a small lidded jar, such as a pint size mason jar, add the fresh lemon juice, extra virgin olive oil, honey, salt and black pepper. Add the lid to the jar and shake well to fully combine, and emulsify, all the ingredients to create a light dressing for the salad.
- Pour the dressing over the salad ingredients and gently toss to combine all the ingredients of the Jennifer Aniston salad. Transfer to a serving bowl and serve.
Notes
- Before cooking, rinse the quinoa under cold water using a fine mesh strainer. This helps remove the natural coating called saponin, which can make the quinoa taste bitter.
- If you’re short on time, spread the cooked quinoa out on a baking sheet to cool more quickly. This helps it reach room temperature faster before refrigerating.
- It might be tempting to skip refrigerating the quinoa, but we don’t recommend it. It gives the quinoa the proper texture, and also ensures your vegetables don’t end up soggy.
- When dicing the cucumber and red onion, try to keep the pieces uniform in size. This ensures even distribution and texture throughout the salad.
- To prevent bruising the fresh herbs, chop them gently using a sharp knife. We don’t recommend using your hands a food processor, as it can make the herbs watery and less flavorful.
- After tossing the salad with the dressing, taste and adjust the seasoning if needed. Like all great salads, make sure you love the flavor!
Nutrition
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