Shaved Zucchini and Spring Pea Salad

I am so excited to be sharing my favorite salad recipe with you today! It’s really rare that you’ll hear me call something my “favorite” so know that I absolutely mean it here. This Shaved Zucchini and Spring Pea Salad is so simple and quick to throw together. With only 8 nutrient-packed ingredients and zero cooking, this recipe is raw, vegan and gluten-free but it is FULL of flavor and will please any eater in your life!

You may have seen me tease this Shaved Zucchini and Spring Pea Salad on Instagram and then saw me eat it a million times over in my Instagram stories. I’ll tell you, this is seriously one of my favorite salads that I’ve been eating for years, and yet it just occurred to me to share the recipe. Selfish much?

Basically, I started throwing together a variation of this salad 4 years ago when my husband and I lived in this awful apartment in downtown Memphis. I was really into eating easy, quick salads that required no fuss. Which is pretty much my m.o. for a salad these days too. But this is one of those salads that has just stuck with me.

Because it is primarily raw zucchini, I tend to o.d. on it during the summer months. It’s super quick to throw together and I love making a double-batch so I can munch on it for lunch two days in a row.

I started making this one before I ever realized I’d own and love a spiralizer, so for the recipe here I decided not to use that machine. If you’re curious, yes it absolutely can be made with the spiralizer and I use this one. But because not everybody has one, I’m sticking with that basic, simple potato peeler, which makes this a shaved zucchini ordeal instead of a zoodle one. You certainly have one of those in your drawer…I hope.

I think the key to this salad here is using plenty of FRESH lemon juice (please don’t use bottled…my stomach just churned) and massaging the whole thing together with your hands. It has barely any oil in it because the avocado lends a lot of fatty goodness to the end result. When you use your hands to gently massage everything together, the avocado kind of creams in there too. Don’t go so far as to completely smash the avocado, because I like it still in chunks, but certainly break it down a touch so you can’t see where the knife hit it.

A few recipe tweaks if you get brave: add shrimp or salmon, that would be amazing; try a mixture of orange and lemon juices for a new pop; throw in some chickpeas to make it an even more complete meal.

Ready to make my favorite salad?

Shaved Zucchini and Spring Pea Salad
Recipe by Melissa @ Treats With A Twist
Serves 2 with additional protein (shrimp or salmon) or 1 if you’re really hungry

INGREDIENTS
2 medium zucchini, washed
½ large lemon
½ avocado
1/3 cup peas*
2 Tbs. hemp hearts (hemp seeds)
3 Tbs. raw pumpkin seeds (pepitas)
2 Tbs. extra virgin olive oil or avocado oil
½ tsp. kosher salt

*I like to buy frozen peas then just soak them in water to thaw while I’m prepping the zucchini, then toss them in the salad. If you want to shuck fresh ones, that’s awesome too.

METHOD
Use a potato/veggie peeler to peel your zucchini into ribbons**, working around the core and discarding the core you can no longer safely peel (don’t peel your fingers off).
To the zucchini, add the avocado, diced, the peas, hemp hearts and pumpkin seeds. Squeeze the lemon over the top, drizzle with the oil and sprinkle with salt. Use your hands to toss the salad together, really massaging it all together and making sure every zucchini ribbon gets attention.
Serve and enjoy!

NOTES:
**You could also use a spiralizer if you have one.
You can make this salad in advance, keeping it in the fridge until you’re ready to use it. The zucchini stays the brightest when you immediately make and eat it, but it tastes just as wonderful a few hours later or the next day.

To Print this recipe, simply copy and paste the text into a new document on your computer and hit print. Old school is working for us, right?

 

These are a few of my other favorite healthy, easy recipes: THIS one, this bowl, and THIS! Let me see your creations by tagging #treatswithatwist on Instagram or Twitter!