Kale salad with buttermilk cucumber dressing is one of my favorite easy lunch salads. We received a gorgeous bunch of red kale several weeks ago from our CSA, along with a cucumber. I definitely wanted kale salad, then decided I also wanted to make my own dressing. It made perfect sense to pair the cucumber with buttermilk and it didn’t hurt matters that I had fresh dried dill on hand as well.
I realize that fresh dried dill may be a contradiction in terms. It might be more accurate to say that I had my own homemade dried dill on hand. About three weeks ago, we received a large bunch of dill fronds in our CSA. I didn’t immediately need dill, so did some research regarding how to best preserve it. As it turns out, you can easily dry dill on low heat in the oven and then crumble it up and keep it in an air tight container for a while. It’s so good added into cream cheese (with smoked salmon on a bagel – trust me, it’s amazing!) as well as into a creamy dressing like this buttermilk cucumber dressing. I’ve also used it to liven up popcorn.
The kale salad with buttermilk cucumber dressing takes very little time to make. I massaged the kale with salt and lemon juice to soften the kale up a bit. The dressing does require blending, which is super easy to accomplish with an immersion blender. I’ll be using the dressing on other salads, and might also use it as a light spread on a bagel or sandwich. It would also be great for dipping veggies.
Ingredients
- A bunch of kale, de-stemmed and torn into small pieces
- Juice from half a lemon
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ¾ cup buttermilk
- ¼ cup plain Greek yogurt
- Juice from half a lemon
- 1 small cucumber, peeled, seeds removed, and finely diced
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon dried dill
- Pepper to taste
Instructions
- For the salad, combine the kale, the juice from the half lemon, and the salt and massage until the kale is softened.
- For the dressing, combine all ingredients and blend with an immersion blender until smooth.
- Dress the kale salad and enjoy! Serves 4.
