Citrus Salad with Avocado, Pistachios, and Feta

From November to March, citrus is at the peak of its season, and a Citrus Salad is a great way to get an entire platter full of light, bright, and fresh flavor in winter. Shall we?

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What is Citrus Salad

Citrus Salad

Health Benefits of Citrus

Ingredients You Need for Citrus Salad

• citrus fruit, any mix of blood orange, cara cara orange, navel orange, oro blanco grapefruit, pink or red grapefruit, pomelo
• avocados
• extra-virgin olive oil
• lemon
• red onions
• feta cheese
• roasted pistachios
• flaky sea salt and pepper

Instructions for How to Make Citrus Salad

Peel and segment citrus, and arrange on a platter with high sides or a shallow bowl.

Place sliced avocado on citrus.

Scatter red onions, pistachios, and crumbled feta.

Drizzle with olive oil, lemon juice, and season with salt.

Pro-tip: Drain off the mixed citrus juice that collect underneath the citrus segments on the platter and mix with olive oil and salt for a vinaigrette or dressing for a different green salad.

What Kind of Citrus to Use for Citrus Salad

There will be everything from deep dark red blood oranges to peachy pink Cara Cara oranges to bright white oro blanco grapefruits at the markets. You can use whatever variety of citrus you want, but try to find a mix of colors and at least one grapefruit to have something very tart, otherwise the salad might be a little too sweet.

Blood Oranges.

Cara Cara Oranges.

Navel and Valencia Oranges

Pink and Red Grapefruit

Oro Blanco Grapefruit

Pomelo

Tangerines, Clementines, Mandarin Oranges

Ingredients Notes and Resources

 

1. Avocado. You can use any form of garlic for Puttanesca: chopped, simply smashed (might need slightly longer cooking time), but I like slicing garlic cloves super thin so they "melt" with the anchovies into the tomatoes. If you use a razor and know that reference, well, we should have dinner some time.
2. Olive Oil. I used this olive oil that's pretty widely available, though it is not organic.
3. Lemon
4. Feta Cheese
5. Pistachios
6. Salt. Th
7. All other fresh herbs and produce from either the Santa Monica Farmers' Market on Wednesday, or Whole Foods Market when I can't find what I need at the farmers' market.

Substitutions and Variations

• Oil - instead of ice berg lettuce, you can use romaine lettuce or spinach
• Feta Cheese - use gluten free buns instead of white bread buns to make this gluten free
• Nuts - the beef hamburger can be replaced with a plant-based burger to make this vegetarian

Pro Tips and Techniques for Citrus Salad

1. On salmon serving sizes: I generally allot 6-8 oz (half a pound) of salmon for each serving, which amounts to two pounds total for this recipe. Eight ounces is actually a pretty large serving, and most people will not eat that much because of all the other delicious little things on the table. However, leftover cooked salmon will keep for about three days in the refrigerator, or frozen for a few weeks, and is great for adding to your lunch and dinner grain bowls.
2. Advance Cooking. You can make the Puttanesca sauce in advance. It will keep in the refrigerator in a sealed container for about three days. However, the recipe comes together so quickly, there's no need to do anything too far in advance.
3. Parmesan. No. Do not put cheese of any kind on this dish. I will disown you. Cheese and fish do not belong together. Not only is the main ingredient salmon, there are anchovies in the sauce. No parmesan.

Tools and Equipment

 

Storage

Store the wet ingredients (lettuce, tomato, onion) separately from the dry ingredients (buns) in the fridge, and recombine when ready. Good for 2-3 days.

These ingredients do/don't stand up well to freezing for X days/weeks/months.

What Else to Serve with Citrus Salad

A generous piece of omega-3-rich salmon in antioxidant-rich tomato sauce can be an entire meal! But if you like to have something either green or starchy as well, here are some great suggestions to pair with:

• Caesar-ish tri-colore salad with an Anchovy Vinaigrette, staying right in the ocean theme
• LOVE a roasted broccoli, or steamed if you want to keep all your cooking on the stovetop
• boil some pasta and toss it right into the Puttanesca sauce, of course
• garlic bread, or even just a darkly toasted slice of bread to dip in the salty, tangy, umami-y Puttanesca sauce

Wine for Citrus Salad with Avocado, Pistachios, and Feta

You have a couple of directions you can follow for wine pairing with Salmon Puttanesca. Either take the lead of the salmon, or follow the briny, umami-rich flavors of the puttanesca sauce.

Fish almost always calls for a high-acid white wine, but salmon is rich so it can handle a light- to medium-bodied red. My favorite Italian red grape, Sangiovese, which is used in familiar Chianti and Rosso di Montalcino, is a great example of a medium-bodied red wine that works well with food. And certain, lighter, fruitier wines made from sangiovese are perfect with spicy saucy tomato-based dishes like a Puttanesca. I love this Rosso di Montalcino, shockingly affordable.

For something a little more fun, this wine is made from California-grown sangiovese, and fermented as whole clusters in a process called carbonic maceration so the wine has a slight natural fizz.

For more tips on pairing wine with food, check out this post about wines from Paso Robles, California, and this post about wines from Santa Barbara, California.

FAQ

Try These Cool Season Salad Recipes, Too

• Arugula Pear Salad
• Mandarin Orange Chicken Salad
• Fall Harvest Salad with Apples and Walnuts
• Persimmon Salad Recipe aka Autumn "Caprese"
• Fall Farmers' Market Salad with Maple Citrus Vinaigrette

And if you're here for the Citrus, check out these recipes:

• Citrus-Roasted Salmon with Herbs Recipe
• Dried Oranges Recipe (the Crisp Ones!)
• Candied Orange Slices
• Pickled Kumquats

Print Recipe

5 from 5 votes

Citrus Salad with Avocado, Pistachios, and Feta Recipe

serves 4

Course: Salad

Cuisine: American

Keyword: avocado, citrus

Ingredients

• 6-8 citrus fruits any kind: blood orange, cara cara orange, navel orange, oro blanco grapefruit, pink or red grapefruit, pomelo
• 4-5 kumquats thinly sliced cross-wise, seeds removed
• 2 firm ripe avocados peeled and sliced lengthwise
• ¼ cup extra-virgin olive oil
• juice from half a lemon
• ¼ cup thinly sliced red onions soaked in cold water for 10 minutes
• ½ cup crumbled feta cheese
• ½ cup roasted pistachios roughly chopped
• flaky sea salt and pepper

Instructions

• Peel citrus, separate segments, and carefully remove the thin skin and white pith from each segment. It is time-consuming and very tedious, but sometimes you need an activity that lets your mind wander while keeping your hands away from your phone. You can of course, peel the citrus, and cut cross-wise into round slices that look like bright colorful suns.
• Arrange the citrus segments and avocado slices on a serving plate with high sides (to keep the citrus juices). Add sliced kumquats.
• Drizzle citrus and avocado with olive oil and lemon juice. Scatter red onions, feta cheese, and chopped pistachios over the citrus and avocado. Sprinkle with ground black pepper and a little bit flaky sea salt (will depend on how salty the feta cheese and pistachios are).
• Citrus segments by themselves, i.e. without olive oil and additional salad ingredients, can be kept in an air-tight container in the refrigerator for two days. Avocados will not last, but why wouldn't you just eat them all.

when you make this recipe, let us know!Mention @TheDelicious or tag #thedeliciousmademedoit!

Afterthoughts

If you take part in the LA nightlife, more specifically, the club scene, then you’re probably familiar with club promoters. You may not know them personally, but you know what I’m talking about. They are the people who throw nightly parties at various venues around town. Club promoters are different from club owners, who are the people who actually own the venue. Club owners have thrown down the fat cash for the real estate. Promoters, however, are the ones who come in at 6 pm on Friday night with their crew – sound, lighting, visual effects, dj, go-go dancers, etc. etc. They don’t pay the rent for the place, but likely they share revenues from the cover charge and the bar with the club owner. The promoter doesn’t own the place, but when the bass starts to boom, well, really, the promoter owns the place.

As greasy, slimy, pale-skinned, fat with cash but gaunt with drugs as promoters are, sometimes I wish I could be a club promoter. For what better career in the world is there than to cruise from lush club to plush club with your entourage and throw the best damned parties that anyone has ever experienced? I love the music, I love the dancing, but what I would love the most is seeing everyone enjoying themselves. What a rush. Throwing parties gives me a rush.

Spanish Tapas Party

When it really comes down to the shiny disco balls, though, I know I’d never make it as club promoter, so I stick with entertaining at home. I love throwing dinner parties.

We started with sangria for a Spanish-themed dinner party.

Though everything else on the menu was heavily influenced by Spain, the Citrus Salad with Avocado could not have been more California. Actually, that's not true because the salad could have been more California if left the citrus off and though the nuts were toasted, they were way too fat to be from California.

There is a reason that there are oranges, lemons, and limes in sangria. Citrus fruits grow in Spain. Yes! It's incredible! Let me impress you with my knowledge of global-economics. Spain is a leading world producer of oranges, lemons, and limes, and is number one for those citrus fruits in the European region. Okay, so that's just my ability to google on demand. However, I don't recall ever seeing avocadoes on a menu in a Spanish restaurant. I couldn't help the avocadoes though because everyone f--king loves avocadoes. Is it enough to say that the Spaniards had a very strong influence on California's history? *eh* It's good enough for me. At least I didn't try to serve guacamole.