Beet Salad with Feta, Cucumbers, and Dill
This Beet Salad with Feta, Cucumbers, and Dill takes only 10 minutes to throw together and is packed with sweet, tangy, and salty flavors. It’s a delicious vegetarian, gluten-free side dish!
This beet salad couldn’t be simpler to make. Beets (roasted, canned, red, or golden) are mixed with salty, crumbled feta cheese, sweet and crunchy cucumbers, and tangy fresh dill.
Everything is tossed in a super simple dressing made from lemon juice, extra-virgin olive oil, and kosher salt.
That’s it!
It’s such a delicious lettuce-free salad that’s packed with super nutritious ingredients.
First of all, beets. Rich in vitamins, fiber, minerals, antioxidants, and anti-inflammatory properties, beets are a nutritional powerhouse. I’m trying to eat more of them, since I only discovered that I liked them fairly recently.
Beets are one of those things that “kids don’t like.” Like meatloaf. WHAT IS GOING ON WITH THAT? OK first of all, I don’t know how meatloaf got a bad reputation. It’s basically a giant meatball. And what could be better than that?
But beets! Good Lord, they’re delicious. Sweet and earthy, with a crisp but soft texture and the most beautiful color.
I’m making up for lost years by getting as many as I can! And thank goodness, my toddler loves them too.
The addition of cucumbers, dill, fresh lemon juice, extra-virgin olive oil, and a little bit of feta cheese add to the delicious taste and nutrition of this beet salad.
It’s the perfect Mediterranean Diet recipe, packed with plant-based goodness and dressed in the healthy fats found in extra-virgin olive oil.
If you’ve never cooked with beets before, they can be a bit intimidating.
As a shortcut, you can use canned beets for this. Canned beets are delicious, and it’s a great way to enjoy them even when they aren’t in season.
But if you want, you can roast your own beets. It’s super easy to do.
Just trim the greens off (if they come with them), wash them clean, wrap them in foil individually, drizzled with about a tablespoon of olive oil, and bake for about an hour at 400 degrees F.
After they’re done, wait for them to cool. Then, they are super easy to peel. You can just use your hands to slide the skin right off!
But that brings me to another point- red beets are VERY red. And they will stain things. If you have marble countertops or other surfaces that are easily stained, be careful. And if you are concerned about your hands getting red, wear gloves. The dye scrubs off after a few washes, but it is kind of a pain.
As an alternative, you can always make this with golden beets! They taste almost identical to red beets, but are far less messy, and are still a gorgeous color.
You can also easily cook beets in your slow cooker or instant pot.
If you have leftover beet greens, don’t throw them out. You can use them as you would spinach or kale- add them to soups, sauté them with some scrambled eggs or throw them in a frittata, or eat them in a salad.
Another thing to keep in mind: the red color of the beets WILL turn everything pink in this beet salad. It’s actually quite pretty, in my opinion.
But if you want to maintain the purity of all the different ingredients when you serve it, I recommend saving a few cucumbers, some feta, and some dill to sprinkle on top after everything else is mixed together. That’s what I did when I took these photos.
Other flavor-packed salad recipes
- Roasted Beet Salad with Grapefruit Vinaigrette
- Egyptian Barley Salad with Pomegranate and Feta
- Mango Quinoa Salad
- Watermelon Salad with Queso Fresco, Lime, and Cilantro.
Beet Salad with Feta, Cucumbers, and Dill
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Ingredients
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
- 3 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
- 2 cups roasted or canned beets cut into roughly 1/2″ pieces (about 2 large beets)
- 1 medium cucumber seeded, halved, and thinly sliced
- 4 oz. feta cheese crumbled
- 1/4 cup fresh dill roughly chopped
Instructions
- To make the dressing: In a small bowl or measuring cup, whisk the lemon juice (1 tablespoon) and kosher salt (1/2 teaspoon) together until the salt is dissolved. Drizzle the extra-virgin olive oil (3 tablespoons) gradually, whisking as you go, in order to incorporate all the ingredients completely.
- Place the sliced beets in a large bowl. Add half the dressing to the bowl and mix together. Let sit while you prep the remaining ingredients.
- Just before serving, add the cucumber, feta cheese, fresh dill and remaining dressing to the bowl and toss together.
Notes
- If you like, you can reserve a little of each ingredient to top the salad on a serving platter so everything isn’t bright pink (if you are using red beets).
- Red wine vinegar or balsamic vinegar can be substituted for the lemon juice, if you prefer.
- Time Saving Tip: Using canned beets is a great shortcut, if you don’t have time to roast your own.
- Money Saving Tip: Roasting your own beets may be cheaper (and will be more flavorful). If you prefer to cook your own beets, you can roast them wrapped in foil with 1 tablespoon of olive oil at 400 degrees for 45-60 minutes, depending on how big they are, then peel them once they are cool enough to handle (the skin will come right off). You can also cook them in your slow cooker or instant pot.
- The provided nutrition information does not include any added sodium from seasoning to taste, any optional ingredients, and it does not take brands into account. Feel free to calculate it yourself using this calculator or by adding the recipe to Yummly.
Nutrition
Nutrition Information Disclaimer
The provided nutrition information is my best estimate and reflects one serving of the recipe (total servings indicated at top of recipe card). It does not include any added sodium from seasoning to taste, any optional ingredients, and it does not take brands into account. I use an automatic API to calculate this information. Feel free to calculate it yourself using one of these tools:
How do I roast fresh beets?
A simple way of roasting beets is in the post – here, I’ll copy and paste it here for you :-)
Just trim the greens off (if they come with them), wash them clean, wrap them in foil individually, drizzled with about a tablespoon of olive oil, and bake for about an hour at 400 degrees F. After they’re done, wait for them to cool. Then, they are super easy to peel. You can just use your hands to slide the skin right off!
Please see more in the post for info about red vs. golden beets, and links to how to make them in an instant pot or slow cooker. Hope that helps!
Hey Elizabeth ! It’s Zachs cousin, Amanda from Colorado. I don’t know why but this is your first recipe I’ve made ! Made it today for a thanksgiving and doubled it for a larger crowd. Can’t wait to see how everyone likes it. So great to stumble upon a recipe of yours !!
Hi Amanda!! So good to hear from you! Hope everyone liked the salad and happy holidays to you and your fam :-)
thank you for a great recipe. I just pulled the beets from my garden today and roasted 2 in the oven for this recipe. I made it with balsamic and also added some walnuts. it was soooo delicious. will be making this regularly
So glad you liked it!
I made it with kale since I didn’t have cucumber. Delicious!
Great idea to use kale. So glad you liked it!
Can’t we just use raw beets?
Raw beets are very hard and crunchy. If you use raw beets in a salad, you can slice them very thin (like with a mandoline) or grate them. The texture and flavor changes a lot when you cook them, and I definitely prefer them cooked. But if you try it with raw, I’d love to know how it comes out for you! Hope that helps!
Delicious, the hit at my dinner party
So glad you liked it!
Looks delicious! Have you tried this with pickled beets?
I haven’t tried with pickled beets, but you can definitely use them! They will add a different flavor – a little more tangy. Roasted beets are soooo good but pickled beets are such an easy shortcut that I think it would be a great substitute! Hope you like it :-)
The salad was pretty good, I did added balsamic vinegar as I felt it needed more acidity which was the perfect addition. While I did enjoy the salad, I’m unsure on the beets I used… Due to time constraints I had to use canned beets, but felt they had hardly any flavor, is that normal of canned beets or in general roasted (1st time beet eater)? I plan to remake this with freshly roasted beets.
Love the idea of adding balsamic vinegar! And yes, canned beets are good in a pinch, but if you have the time for it, roasted fresh beets are SOOOO much better. Hope you like it more when you try with fresh!
This was very good and super easy to make.
So glad you liked it!
Not sure what I did wrong but I can’t eat this….sorry, glad so many folks love it, but I just can’t get it down 😖
Some people just really don’t like beets! Or there was probably just some combo of flavors that didn’t suit your specific tastes. To each their own :-)
I loved this recipe, i used balsamic vinegar instead of lemon and added walnuts. I could eat this all day!!!
So glad you liked it, and love your ingredient suggestions!
This was so delicious and easy to make!
Glad you liked it!
Could you use fresh basil instead of mint?
You mean basil instead of dill? Absolutely! On that note, mint would also be delicious. I think any of those herbs, or a combination, would be great. Hope you like it!
I love roasted beets and these proportions allowed the flavours to come out. Thanks for sharing.
So glad you liked it!
Yummy! Used as main course for 2. Next time I’ll sub OJ for lemon juice.
So glad you liked it, and I love the idea of using orange juice! Orange and beets are sooooo yummy together.
added black olives & sweet onions
Yum, great additions!
I made this salad today for the first time mainly because I had all the ingredients at hand. I am so happy I did, it is the best beet salad I have tried and will appear often on my table from now on.
So happy you liked it!
This salad was amazing!!! We are going to make this regularly! Thank you for sharing this gem.
So glad you liked it!
Very simple, but delicious recipe! The first time, I made this with cucumber and red beets from my grandmother’s vegetable garden, and the flavours were amazing. Later, I made it again using cucumber from the supermarket, and I was less blown away by it, but still tasted great. This is also a good recipe to make ahead of time and pack for lunch, it stays fresh for a long time.
Garden vegetables are always more delicious- you’re so lucky you got to use them for this! I’m hoping to have both in my garden this spring too. Glad you liked it!
This is delicious! I love beets, and the feta and lemon dressing go so well with their natural sweetness!
So glad you liked it! Thanks!
Beets are nutritious and they’re a lot more versatile than people realize. They can also be a bit heavy, and the addition of the cucumber, feta, and mint in this recipe really brightens things up.