Restaurant Salad Recipes

You've Come a Long Way, Baby!

Restaurant Recipes
for Salads and Dressings


A Revolution ...Salad Recipes

How long has it been since you've had a delicious salad? I mean a really good one?

The kinds of recipes we have today and what we think about salads in general has changed a great deal in the last 40-50 years.

(Wonderful grilled chicken salad!)

Pasta salads, potato salads, salads with vegetables and fruits, seafood salads, meat salads, Caesars, mixed wild green salads, dessert salads, gelatin salads ... the choices go on and on.


It used to be a salad was something served just before an entree or sometimes with the entree. That salad was usually iceberg lettuce with French or Thousand Island dressing or oil and vinegar served in cruets. WOW! THINGS HAVE CHANGED!

The “salad revolution” resulted in the development of dozens and dozens of customer-tested, customer-approved restaurant salad recipes.


(Pam REALLY enjoys her fresh baby spinach salad for lunch. Notice the bran muffin!)



Restaurant Salad Recipes


Almond Chicken (or Turkey) Salad

What flexibility this Almond Chicken Salad Recipe provides This restaurant recipe can be used to make a sandwich or a salad or by “tweaking” it just a little in creating a number of really great appetizers! Preparation time: 20 minutes. This recipe makes approximately 8 servings if used as a sandwich or a salad. For appetizers, much more.

Asian Wild Rice Salad

An Asian Rice Salad recipe that is delicious, nutritious and economical. What more could anyone want? Preparation time: 30 minutes + rice cooking time. Serves 4

Avocado, Tomato, Romaine - Easy Salad

This is an easy salad recipe but looks elegant and is a salad that is sure to impress you and your guests. Preparation time; 20 minutes. Serves 4

Beef Taco Salad

American cuisine is really a "melting pot" of world-wide recipes. This beef taco restaurant salad is a huge seller. ENJOY! Preparation time: about 45 minutes. Serves 4-6.

Chicken Fajita Salad

This tasty chicken fajita salad is an easy chicken salad recipe you can make at home without waiting for a table at the restaurant. Preparation time: 20 minutes. Serves 4

Chinese-Style Noodle Salad

This is a really delicious Chinese Noodle salad and it is made special by a secret restaurant salad dressing recipe. Preparation time: 45 minutes. Serves 10

Endive With Apples and Bleu Cheese Crumbles

This endive salad is a favorite at the restaurant because of the combination of apples, walnuts and crumbled Bleu cheese with vinegar and oil dressing. Preparation time: 20 minutes. Serves 6

Grape Salad

This Grape Salad Recipe caught me by surprise. It was sent to me. When I first read through it I wasn't sure what it would really taste like. I was in for a wonderful surprise. Preparation time: 15 minutes. Serves 16

Ham Salad

This favorite restaurant recipe for ham salad can be used for sandwiches or salad. Preparation time: 20 minutes. Serves 8-10

Mandarin Oranges, Wild Greens & Sugared Walnuts

Refreshing, Simple, Elegant. Preparation time 20 minutes. Serves 2

Molded Cranberry Salad

This restaurant recipe is for a tasty and beautiful Molded Cranberry Salad. This can make a great centerpiece for a large holiday family dinner if you use a mold. Otherwise you can cut the salad into individual portions. Preparation time: 20 minutes. Serves: 8-10.

Italian Salad

If you want to leave the Italian salami out of this Italian Salad restaurant recipe you'll still have a delicious salad to serve. Of course one of the important ingredients is an excellent Italian dressing. Preparation time: 8 minutes. Serves 4

A Christmas Salad

Named for its green baby spinach and fresh red raspberries. Preparation time: 5 minutes. Serves 10

Spinach and Strawberry Salad

This quick and easy spinach and strawberry restaurant salad recipe will give you a lively, refreshing flavorful treat and the salad has great "eye appeal." This salad always gets rave reviews from guests at home and at the restaurant. Preparation time: 15 minutes. Serves 8.

Seared Scallops on Spinach Salad

This seafood salad is a very special restaurant recipe that combines scallops in a warm spinach salad and calls for roasted red pepper vinaigrette that brings everything together for a real culinary treat. Preparation time: 30 minutes. Serves 4.

Pear and Gorgonzola Salad

You'll love this pear salad if you like blue cheese married with avocado and pear and enhanced with sugared walnuts. Preparation time: 15 minutes (after you have your sugared walnuts ready). Serves 4.

Fruit Salad with Avocado, Grapefruit and Orange Slices

This is a delicious, nutritious and colorful salad with Avocado Mint Vinaigrette! Preparation time: 30 minutes. Serves 6-8

Grilled Vegetable Salad

Summer and Fall are perfect times for vegetables and grilling. Combine the two: Grilled Vegetable Salad Recipe. Preparation time: 30 minutes. Serves 4-6, depending on portion.

Cauliflower Salad

I serve this Cauliflower Salad when fresh cauliflower is readily available and when I am serving buffet style, at home or at the restaurant. It is easy, and very good. Preparation time: 25-30 minutes. Serves: 8-10.

Penne,’ Asparagus and Smoked Salmon Salad

Preparation time: 45 minutes, but pasta salad should be chilled for at least one hour when finished.  This restaurant pasta salad serves 6-8 people depending on portion desired.

Prawn Salad with Butter Lettuce, Avocados and Tomatoes

Yummmmy - serve with homemade Thousand Island Dressing. Preparation time: 25 minutes. Serves 4

Spinach Mushroom Salad

Nicely sliced, white mushrooms are really all you need for this spinach salad recipe but if you want to add some thin-sliced red onion and/or crisp bacon pieces, that's great, too.

The restaurant salad dressing recipe used with this spinach salad is easy but it really pulls the entire salad together. Preparation time: 10 minutes. Serves 4-6 depending on portion desired.


Cole Slaw - Best Ever!

This Cole Slaw Recipe is one of the most popular salad recipes at the restaurant. Preparation time: 10 - 15 minutes. Serves 4.  Enjoy!

Chick-Fil-A Coleslaw Recipe

My goodness! Chick-Fil-A-Coleslaw-Recipe is no longer being made by the popular restaurant chain as of January 2016! But I have the original Chick-Fil-A Coleslaw Recipe for you to try at home.

Now you have it, too. Preparation time: 15 minutes.  Serves 6-8.

Potato Salad

Potato salad is an American tradition. There are entire cookbooks dedicated only to potato salad. The potato salad restaurant recipe I provide is one of several favorites of my guests. Preparation time: 1 hour. 8-10 servings, depending on size of each.

Seafood Salad

What makes this restaurant salad recipe somewhat unusual is that it requires a loaf of thick sliced white sandwich bread. I use canned or packaged wild salmon or wild, white, troll caught albacore tuna. Preparation time: 25 minutes, but must refrigerate over night. Serves 8.

Combo Vegetable Salad

Simple as it gets ("simple is as simple does" :-) ) but it is simply delicious and nutritious. Preparation time: 20-25 minutes. Serves 10-12

Waldorf Salad

Credit for the original Waldorf Salad I believe goes to the maître d'hôtel Oscar Tschirky of New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel in the 1896. Originally this salad contained only apples, celery and mayonnaise. The chopped walnuts were added later and this version has a twist or two that has proven successful with the restaurant patrons. Preparation time: about 25 minutes. Salad recipe serves 8-10.

Thousand Island Dressing

Two versions. Great as a veggie dip, too. Preparation time; 15 minutes. 40 servings at 2 tablespoons per serving

Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing

This Balsamic Vinaigrette Recipe creates my favorite dressing for almost any of the salads I prepare. I also use it to top fresh vegetables, especially garden fresh organic tomatoes, sliced thin. Then I top those and this dressing with freshly grated Parmesan cheese! Yummy! Preparation time: 5 minutes. Makes 1 cup.

Bleu Cheese Dressing

With the "explosion" of salad recipes came another flurry of restaurant recipes ...salad dressings. This Bleu Cheese salad dressing is so simple but so good many of the customers use sides of this salad dressing with their beef orders. Preparation time: 15 minutes. Serves approximately 15.

French Dressing

This homemade French Salad Dressing Recipe is delicious and quick and easy. Preparation time: 20 minutes. 12-15 servings.

Sweet and Sour Salad Dressing

Before the restaurant opened many years ago I was determined to develop the perfect Sweet Sour Salad Dressing to use as my House Dressing. Here it is! It's an award winner! Preparation time: 15 minutes. Makes 4-5 cups.




Thank you for your interest in real restaurant recipes and in cooking with confidence and style. ENJOY your restaurant recipes for salads and the company of those you share them with! - Donna


“To remember a successful salad is generally to remember a successful dinner; at all events, the perfect dinner necessarily includes the perfect salad.”

George Ellwanger