In addition to beans, this salad features corn, peas, and red onion. The dressing is a tangy and mildly spicy vinaigrette. This is a colorful, hearty salad, perfect for any of the three P's: potlucks, parties, and picnics!
4-Bean Salad
- Prep Time: 25 mins
- Cook Time: 15 mins
- Total Time: 40 mins
- Yield: 8 (makes about 10 cups salad and 1 cup dressing) 1x
Ingredients
- For the salad:
- 3 cups precooked green beans (cut into 1-inch pieces; or 2 14.5-ounce cans, drained and rinsed)
- 1 can cooked black beans (15 ounces; about 1 ½ cups), drained and rinsed
- 1 can cooked kidney beans (15 ounces; about 1 ½ cups), drained and rinsed
- 1 can cooked garbanzo beans (15 ounces; about 1 ½ cups), drained and rinsed
- 1 ½ cups peas (thaw first if frozen)
- 1 ½ cups corn (thaw first if frozen)
- ½ cup finely chopped red onion
- Tomato Vinaigrette:
- 1 medium tomato, chopped (including seeds; about ¾ cup)
- ⅓ cup vinegar (I like apple cider)
- 2 tablespoons mustard (I like Dijon or stone ground)
- 1 teaspoon ground cumin
- 1 medium clover garlic
Instructions
- Place all of the salad ingredients (green beans, black beans, kidney beans, garbanzo beans, peas, corn, and onion) into a large bowl.
- Place all of the vinaigrette ingredients (tomato, vinegar, mustard, cumin, and garlic) into a blender, and blend until smooth. Stir into the salad.
Notes
A little chopped fresh parsley or basil is also nice in this salad.
If you're feeling decadent, add 1 chopped ripe avocado.
Nutrition
- Serving Size: ⅛ recipe, 1.2 cups
- Calories: 289
- Sugar: 8.3g
- Sodium: 52mg
- Fat: 3g
- Saturated Fat: 0.4g
- Carbohydrates: 52.5g
- Fiber: 15.9g
- Protein: 16.0g
- Cholesterol: 0
This looks amazing. Thank you for sharing.
Perfect for all P's! Love it. Thanks Cathy, looks wonderful.
Absolutely delish! I added celery and pimentos.....thanks for the recipe.
To die for! I I also put a handful of fresh parsley in the dressing ingredients, and shaved some slippers of fresh carrot into the salad mix as well. The carrot really gives it a boost in color. Thanks for all of your fabulous recipes.
I've been enjoying this delicious salad all week. I'm always amazed by how flavorful your dishes are without a speck of salt. Thanks, Cathy!
Love this recipe; added a few cukes because they're coming in fast and furiously in the garden and I have to do something with them. Thanks for this recipe
Great idea. Think I will sub zukes for the green beans as I don't have those
It is hard to believe that this dressing does not have any oil in it--my husband and I did not miss it at all! Flavorful and satisfying!
Wonderful salad especially on hot summer days.....The dressing is quick and delicious.
Thanks for the recipe.
Thanks for the comment, Roland! 😉 Glad you liked it!
Looks yummy! How long do you cook your green beans in the preassure cooker?
Hi, I just cook them on the stovetop for about 5-8 minutes. Never tried them in the pressure cooker (just the dry beans). 🙂
This dressing with the combo of beans is genius! I don't miss the lack of oil in the dressing at all. I traded fig infused vinegar for apple cider vinegar (less harsh). I refer to your vast variety of meals and snacks for my husband who recently and drastically changed to a SOS-free diet for health reasons. While I have not
completely converted to SOS-free diet yet I must admit that I enjoy what I've made and shared with him. You have literately saved his life and made mine much easier when finding meals to make for him. The simple ingredients you use are common and pretty easily made. Thank you for sharing. Do you think you can come up with a recipe for either fig bars or fig cookies as they are his favorite.
Hi Francine, thank you for your kind note. That makes me truly happy to hear that my recipes have helped you and your husband. I will look into making a figgy recipe; from dried or fresh? I see the fig trees around here are ripening, yay! 😉
Thanks for another tasty dish, Cathy! I made this salad over the week-end, doubling up the garlic and adding a little extra dijon, and we loved it. We had leftovers and I found that the next day the tanginess of the dressing had faded. The cumin flavor was still strong, but some of the zip was missing. I added a bit more vinegar, some garlic powder, and chopped up some fresh basil. That refreshed the flavor. In the future, I would plan on making a second batch of dressing to add shortly before serving if I were going to make this ahead of time -- like the night before.
This salad is very good as a topper for a base salad of raw baby spinach, thin sliced red onion, cucumber, chopped ripe tomato, and some steamed fingerling potatoes.
I loved the idea of using a tomato as the dressing base! Thanks again!
Kris
Made this tonight. Terrific, thanks!
Hi! If the black, kidney, and garbanzo beans are canned, do I cook them after rinsing them--or are they OK to eat without cooking? I've never been sure of this, but it sounds like Dr. Greger doesn't cook them. Also, since I use Eden Organics (no salt--just kombu, I think--and BPA-free lining), should I still rinse the beans?
Finally, do you have pressure-cooker guidelines for cooking dry beans? I would like to go that route in the future.
Thank you, Cathy!
Hi Elizabeth, You don't need to cook canned beans; they are already cooked. I do always rinse them, no matter what brand they are. If you're using a good brand like Eden and you were adding the beans to a soup or stew, you could add the whole can without draining I suppose. For cooking beans in the pressure cooker, I just use the guidelines that came with the instruction/recipe book. Each type of bean will take a different amount of time. So look in the booklet that came with your pressure cooker, or Google the question online along with the brand of your pressure cooker. 🙂
This was delicious!! I cut the recipe in half and still had too much for us to eat so I'm going to quarter it next time.
Yay! Thanks Judy! 😉
This is very tasty! Eating it tonight and feels like a great addition for holiday meals.
Great recipe. Hard to believe no added fat or salt. I accidentally grabbed a can of cannellini beans instead of the garbanzos, and it tasted great. Looking forward to trying it with garbanzos for the added texture. I added celery too, love it in any bean salad. That salad dressing is genius. Made plenty for leftovers, and we heated the salad up a bit the second night, and it was delicious tossed with roasted taters and cauliflower on a cold winter night. Thanks for this healthy, delicious recipe.
This is the best bean salad I have ever had - hands down! I am on weight watchers using the simply filling plan, and this salad also works perfectly with it! I am in LOVE!
Just made the 4-bean salad. The dressing adds a perfect zing to this powerfully nutritious salad. Thanks for the recipe and your efforts to promote a clean diet.
I just found your website the other day after reading How Not To Die. Your recipes look wonderful and healthy. Compared to other similar sources, your recipes are generally easy, and I can make quite a few of them with ingredients I have on hand...that's a huge plus. Quick question: how much corn should I put in the 4-bean salad recipe? Thank you very much for making these fantastic recipes available.
Hi Tom, thanks for catching that. I've added it; 1.5 cups. 🙂
Hello Cathy! I have your wonderful cookbook but find myself on your website more often so I can print recipes, read comments, and check out if there are new ones! I am trying several new (new to me) recipes this weekend. I have a question about the corn and peas for this recipe: I am using frozen, so is defrosting all that is necessary, no additional cooking first? Thank you for your beautiful recipes and for getting back to me! 🙂 Susi
Yes, no need to cook them further. They are flash cooked before freezing, so just thawing them is sufficient. 🙂
I was so pleased to see that you were with True North. As a result of your SOS recipes, I will be checking your site more often. Thank you.
The salad was delish just as written. Even a 15 year old "I'm not going to be vegan" enjoyed it.
Yay! Thanks Diana! 😉
I just made this to bring to a Thanksgiving feast tomorrow. It was so easy to make. I added a carton of cherry tomatoes, chopped into 1/4's and a cup of grated carrots for color. I think I will squeeze the juice of a fresh lemon on just before serving. Thank you, another great recipe!