This colorful and refreshing summer salad is very easy to make. Sweet watermelon paired with spicy red onion and arugula is a surprisingly delicious combination, along with lime juice, cucumber and fresh mint!
Watermelon Salad
- Prep Time: 15 mins
- Total Time: 15 mins
- Yield: 4 (makes about 6 cups) 1x
Ingredients
- 4 cups seedless watermelon cubes (about ½-inch)
- 2 cups baby arugula leaves (packed)
- 1 cup thinly sliced cucumber
- ¼ cup thinly sliced red onion (see Notes)
- ¼ cup chopped fresh mint
- ¼ cup lime juice (1-2 limes)
- freshly ground black pepper to taste (optional)
Instructions
- Toss all of the ingredients in a medium bowl. Chill before serving (or if you want to serve immediately, be sure the watermelon, cucumber and lime juice is cold upon preparing). Garnish if desired with a little freshly ground black pepper.
Notes
Cucumber: I think thin, delicate slices of cucumber are best for this recipe, but feel free to cut your cucumbers any way you like. I used my favorite hand-held mandolin to quickly and uniformly slice mine.
Melon: If you can get your hands on a seedless yellow watermelon, this would be great too. Any kind of melon can be used instead of watermelon. Strawberries are also nice (I would use 1 cup strawberries and 3 cups melon).
Arugula: Arugula, a delicate peppery green, is perfect in this recipe, but if you can’t find it, you can use baby spinach leaves (whole or coarsely chopped).
Lime juice: You can also use lemon juice instead of lime, or your favorite balsamic vinegar; but I think the fresh taste of lime is the best complement with watermelon.
Mint: Some watermelon salads call for fresh basil instead of mint, so feel free to use this instead if you like.
Red onion: At the time of this posting, there is a recall on certain types of onions. If you are not comfortable using these, you can also use thinly sliced green onions (scallions), or just leave the onion out.
Above: Four cups of watermelon cubes and 2 cups of arugula. This is baby arugula, so it's fine to use the whole leaves; but if yours is the larger-leaf variety, give it a few chops first.
Above: The prepared chopped mint, lime juice, and thinly sliced red onion and cucumber (use a fresh, firm cucumber if you can; they slice easier and taste better).
I soak the onion in lemon or lime juice 1st. It "cooks" the onion. Raw onion does not agree with me so this works well for me. Instead of cucumber I use olives but will try the cucumber. I love this meal and happily eat a lg bowl of it.
Good idea, Jeanie! 🙂 Thanks!
Great tip Jeanie - I love the look of the red onions but boy oh boy sometimes they are almost hot... I have raw cooked them in lemon/lime/vinegar before too so I will use that method because this sounds & looks like a great recipe. I might also try a switch to a sweet yellow onion if I can find one. Come on summer watermelons! 😉