Papaya Mixed Green Salad with Mint Cilantro Salad Dressing

Papaya Mixed Green Salad with Mint Cilantro Dressing

Papaya Mixed Green Salad is a perfect recipe for salad lunch / light dinner / side dish. It is high in fibers, vitamins, minerals, has high level of antioxidants, is flavorful, and is low in calories. Flavors of mixed greens, cucumber, corn, carrot, sunflower seeds, and rich and flavorful ripe papaya makes this salad irresistible. You can eat this salad as it is, or you can drizzle low calorie yet flavorful mint-cilantro salad dressing on this salad.  This is a must try recipe! This will not only satisfy your taste buds but also improve your digestive health.

Understanding the Salad Ingredients and their Nutritional Value-

For the base of this salad, you can use iceberg lettuce or romaine lettuce or both. Choose any of this lettuce according to your taste. Lettuce provides the fiber content and water content and makes the salad satisfying and fulfilling. Next comes power greens. Power greens (spring mix) are the mixture of organic baby spinach, organic baby kale, organic green and red chard, and arugula. These power greens are extremely nutritious and provides high fiber contents, vitamins, and minerals. If you do not have power greens at home, you can skip the step or add any of these green leaves available to you in your salad.

Besides healthy leafy vegetables, you can add nice juicy cucumber, boiled corn, shredded carrots to the salad. These vegetables add crunch, nutrition, and flavors to the salad. If you want to add protein to this salad, you can add a cup of boiled quinoa, boiled or canned garbanzo beans (or chickpeas), sprouted mung beans, or boiled or canned kidney beans, or any protein of your choice to this salad.  You can skip adding protein to the salad, if you are trying to make a protein free diet or treat constipation and need just high fiber salad.

Next step is adding most important ingredient and that is adding ripe, juicy, sweet, and delicious papaya. Papaya has enzymes like papain and chymopapain that help in improving digestion and reduce inflammation. Papaya helps in improving gut health, curing upset stomach, and improve gastric issues. Many over the counter digestive supplements have papaya as one of the ingredients. Papaya is also known to help cure acute pain and inflammation caused due to arthritis and asthma. Papaya is used as kitchen remedy to resolve small digestive and inflammatory issues. So, it is very important to add papaya in our diet in one or the other form to improve our health or to maintain our good health.

For the crunch and to enhance flavor, I like to add croutons and roasted organic sunflower seeds. Sunflower seeds have mild and nutty flavor which enhances the flavor when roasted. They are high in Vitamins and antioxidants that help protect our body’s cells from damage. They are excellent source of several nutrients and can help prevent chronic diseases. In case of croutons, you can use either store bought or home-made croutons.

How to boil Quinoa?

Take small boiling pot and add 2 cups of water. Boil it at the medium heat. Add a cup of quinoa grains to the boiling water and let them cook. Within 5 – 10 minutes, the cooked quinoa will be ready. Boiled quinoa are little softer, breakable when pressed between two fingers, and have little tails coming out of the grain. If you see these signs in quinoa, it is ready and cooked.

How to make Croutons?

To make home-made croutons, we can use any bread that we like or have at home. Cut the bread into small squares. Marinate the bread with salt, pepper, garlic, or any seasoning of the choice. Sprinkle few drops of olive oil and mix the bread pieces well with the seasoning and olive oil. Let it marinate for 10 minutes and either fry them until they turn golden brown or line the marinated pieces on the baking tray and roast them until the turn golden brown in the oven. Next thing to add to the Papaya Mixed Green salad is Mint Cilantro dressing.

Mint-Cilantro Salad Dressing Recipe

It is made from simple ingredients in no more than five minutes and can be used in any way you like. All you need is cilantro (coriander leaves), mint leaves, jalapeno (green chili or red chili flakes), garlic clove, olive oil, salt (simple or Himalayan salt or black salt or kosher salt), lime or lemon juice (or vinegar) and water. Making this is just a two-step recipe. You literally just have to wash and chop the ingredients and blend them well. The salad dressing / marinade / dip is ready to eat.

Preparation and Cooking Time – 5 minutes

Ingredients

• 1 bunch of fresh and washed cilantro (Coriander leaves) – (2 cups of chopped cilantro or coriander leaves)
• ½ bunch of fresh and washed mint leaves – (1 cup of chopped mint leaves)
• 1 clove of peeled and chopped garlic or 1/2 teaspoon of garlic paste (this ingredient is optional)
• ½ cup of olive oil (I use extra virgin organic olive oil)
• Salt to taste (regular or Himalayan salt or black salt or kosher salt)
• 1/3 chopped green jalapeno (or 1 chopped green chili, or ½ teaspoon of red chili flakes or ½ teaspoon of black pepper)
• 1 – 2 freshly squeezed big lime or lemon juice (or 1-2 tablespoon of white vinegar) 
•  ¼ -1/2 cup of water only if needed to blend the mix properly

Recipe

• Take all the fresh ingredients mentioned above and wash them thoroughly.
• Chop them well.

• Mix all the ingredients in mixer / blender / food processor jar and blend them well.

• Mint Cilantro salad dressing / vinaigrette / marinade / dip is ready to eat.

Click the link below to know more about Mint Cilantro Salad Dressing-

Mint Cilantro Salad Dressing Recipe Article

How to make Papaya Mixed Green Salad?

Preparation and Cooking Time – 10 – 20 minutes

Ingredients

• One Iceberg Lettuce or One Romaine Lettuce – wash and chop the leaves
• 2-3 cups of wash and chopped power greens or spring mix (organic baby spinach, organic baby kale, organic green and red chard, and arugula) – if you do not have power greens or spring mix, you can add any of the salad greens you have to the salad.
• 1 cup of boiled corn
• 1 cup of shredded carrot
• 1 cucumber washed and sliced
• Salt and pepper according to your taste
• ½ teaspoon Chaat masala (this is optional – it is available in Indian store)
• 1 ripe and juicy papaya washed and chopped
• Mint cilantro salad dressing
• 2-3 tablespoons of roasted sunflower seeds
• 1 cup of croutons (croutons are optional)
• 1 cup of shredded cheese of your choice – parmesan / cheddar / mixed cheese (cheese is optional you can avoid adding cheese to make it vegan)
• Add 1 cup of protein of your choice (add a cup of boiled quinoa, boiled garbanzo beans (or chickpeas), sprouted mung beans, or boiled kidney beans, or any protein of your choice) – This step is optional.

Recipe

• Take big deep bowl / salad bowl.
• Make a layer of chopped lettuce leaves.

• Then make a layer of power green leaves or spring mix (organic baby spinach, organic baby kale, organic green and red chard, arugula) – if you do not have power greens or spring mix leaves, you can add any of the salad greens you have to the salad.

• Add sliced cucumbers, boiled corn, shredded carrot, and papaya to the bowl.

• Sprinkle salt, pepper, and chaat masala (chaat masala is available in Indian store and it is optional).

• Add roasted sunflower seeds.
• Add 1 cup of protein of your choice (add a cup of boiled quinoa, boiled garbanzo beans (or chickpeas), sprouted mung beans, or boiled kidney beans, or any protein of your choice) – This step is optional.

• Add croutons and shredded cheese. If you do not want croutons or cheese, you can skip this step too.

• Add mint cilantro dressing to the salad. (Adding salad dressing is optional too. Salad tastes delicious without salad dressing too. But adding salad dressing will enhance the flavor more.)

• Mix every thing well with big salad spoons.
• Salad is ready to eat / serve.

Tips for Salad

• This salad can be used to make watermelon mixed green salad, mango mixed green salad, and cantaloupe mixed green salad by replacing papaya with watermelon, mango, or cantaloupe (musk melon).
• This salad tastes great without salad dressing too.
• This salad tastes great without croutons too.
• Chaat masala used in this salad is optional. If you want to add it, it is easily available in nearby Indian store.

Tips for Mint Cilantro Salad Dressing

• You can make dressing with only cilantro or only mint leaves too if you do not have both at home.
• You can store this salad dressing / marinade / dip in refrigerator for a week and use it.
• It tastes the best when eaten fresh.

Click the link below to know more about Mint Cilantro Salad Dressing-

Mint Cilantro Salad Dressing Recipe Article

Click the link below to know how to make Indian style Cilantro Mint Chutney / Dip

Cilantro Mint Chutney – Dip / Coriander Mint Chutney – Dip / Fudina Chutney

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