Greek Garbanzo Salad

If you’ve followed me for a length of time you will notice that I have spurts of healthy cooking, be it Weight Watchers, Cook This Not That, etc., but I always seem to go back to my norm of cookery, the unhealthy southern fare I grew up eating, heavy on the butter and cream. My only saving grace is I’ve only fried maybe 2 things in the last few years, eggs and salmon patties. What you can’t see are the meals my husband and I eat the rest of the time. He doesn’t need to watch his intake and count calories and I do, or did before now. I’ll spare you the nitty gritty but some factors in our private lives have made it imperative that I follow a certain diet plan, a Low Amylose Diet to be exact. So due to this for the time being the majority of post for the next say 6 months will be following this plan. Now that I’ve shared that let’s get started on the first recipe, shall we?

I needed a side dish that I could eat without guilt and that would fit the outdoor picnic occasion, so I made this salad based off of some ideas I had seen online of garbanzo bean salad, although I couldn’t tell you where or when.

This dish is the one to eat if you are seriously craving pasta. I loved it! So much so that I ate half of of dish, every single glorious flavorful bite.

Greek Garbanzo Salad

Dressing:

3/4 cup of extra virgin olive oil
1/4 cup of red wine vinegar
1 1/2 teaspoons of crushed oregano
1 teaspoon of salt
pinch of pepper

Put all ingredients into a mason jar, screw on the cap and shake until combined. Chill overnight or a minimum of 3 hours.

Salad:

16 ounce can garbanzo beans, drained and rinsed
½ cucumber, peeled and small diced
roma tomatoes, small dice
10 kalamata olives, sliced
¼ cup feta cheese, crumbled
2 tablespoons dressing, recipe above

Add all the salad ingredients except the feta cheese into a bowl and toss to combine. Chill for 2 plus hours. Just before serving stir in the feta cheese.

Makes 4 servings at 174 calories each or 6 servings at 116 calories each.

If you’re not following the Low Amylose Diet you could always add ½ a purple onion thinly sliced to the salad as well which will up the calorie count a bit.