Salad with Avocado, Olives & Yogurt Dressing
One clove of garlic, pressed raw into nonfat yogurt with a splash of vinegar. That three-ingredient dressing ties together a plate of warm green beans, garden peas straight from the pot, sliced avocado, halved cherry tomatoes, a handful of mixed greens, and eight olives.
28 grams of fiber from five different ingredients, 36 grams of fat from two whole-food sources, and 647 calories total. The avocado and olives carry the fat. The beans, peas, bread, and avocado carry the fiber. Whole wheat toast rounds it out. Ten minutes, no oven.
One clove of garlic, pressed raw into nonfat yogurt with a splash of vinegar. That three-ingredient dressing ties together a plate of warm green beans, garden peas straight from the pot, sliced avocado, halved cherry tomatoes, a handful of mixed greens, and eight olives.
28 grams of fiber from five different ingredients, 36 grams of fat from two whole-food sources, and 647 calories total. The avocado and olives carry the fat. The beans, peas, bread, and avocado carry the fiber. Whole wheat toast rounds it out. Ten minutes, no oven.
Ingredients
- green beans (frozen) 5 ounces
- garden peas (frozen) 3 ounces
- avocado 1
- garlic 1 clove
- cherry tomatoes 8 pieces
- yogurt, nonfat 2 fluid ounces
- vinegar 0.5 tablespoon
- mixed salad 1 handful
- olives 8 pieces
- bread, whole wheat 2 slices
Method
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Cook the green beans according to the instructions until tender but still crisp.
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Meanwhile, cook the garden peas following the package instructions.
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Peel the avocado and cut it into strips. Press the garlic and halve the cherry tomatoes.
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Make a dressing with the yogurt, vinegar and garlic. Season with pepper and salt.
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Prepare a salad with the mixed salad, green beans, peas and olives. Distribute the avocado and tomatoes over the salad.
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Drizzle some dressing over the salad and serve the rest on the side. Serve with (toasted) bread.
Press the garlic fresh into the yogurt rather than using powder. Research tested raw garlic stirred directly into yogurt and found zero harm to the live probiotic cultures at food-typical concentrations. The garlic’s natural prebiotic sugars actually serve as food for those same bacteria.
Researchers at Ohio State served the same type of salad with and without avocado and measured what the body actually absorbed. With avocado present, beta-carotene absorption jumped 15.3 times and alpha-carotene 7.2 times. The cherry tomatoes, mixed greens, and green beans in this salad all carry these fat-soluble nutrients, and the avocado’s monounsaturated fat helps the body take them in.
Why This Works
Behind this recipe
Can this salad work as a full meal with 26 grams of protein?
At 26 grams per serving, the protein is moderate but not the whole story. This plate packs 28 grams of fiber from five different ingredients, and fiber at this level has been independently linked to improved body composition in research, even without reducing total calories.
Read the full evidence reviewWhy frozen green beans and peas instead of fresh?
Frozen vegetables are typically picked and processed within hours of harvest, which locks in nutrients that fresh produce gradually loses during transport and shelf time. For green beans and peas, the texture after a quick boil from frozen is tender but still crisp, exactly what a salad needs. Fresh works too, but frozen is faster, cheaper, and nutritionally comparable.
Does pressing raw garlic into yogurt harm the probiotics?
Research tested exactly this. At food-typical amounts, raw garlic did not inhibit the yogurt’s probiotic strains. The garlic’s natural prebiotic sugars actually served as a carbon source for Lactobacillus bacteria. The dressing’s two core ingredients work together rather than against each other.
