Irish Salad

August 9, 2019 by Irish American Mom 34 Comments

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What is an Irish salad you may ask?

An Irish salad is an ensemble of cold vegetables, meat, eggs and cheese, carefully arranged on a plate, and not tossed or mixed in any shape or form.

What to include in an Irish salad meat, tomato, lettuce, boiled egg, cucumber, beets, coleslaw, grated cheese and mashed potato salad — An Irish Pub Salad

Irish vs American Salads
Irish Pub Salad in the USA
Essential Ingredients For An Irish Salad Plate
Optional Ingredients
A Few More Ingredient Choices
Getting Creative with Salad
Recipe Card for Irish Salad
Which Ingredients Would You Choose?

Irish vs American Salads

For any readers who grew up in Ireland, I'm quite certain you frequently ate salad for tea or your evening meal during the summer months.

I'll never forget my surprise on reading a New York restaurant salad menu, when I first arrived in the United States over 30 years ago.

Until then I had no idea salads come in so many shapes and sizes, tossed and untossed selections, some with fruit and veg mixed together, and smothered in every kind of dressing under the sun.

Mayonnaise or salad cream were the fancy salad dressings when I was growing up in Dublin. Mayonnaise was always served as a delicate blob on our salad plates, and not drizzled all over the salad American style.

A plate of food on a table, with Salad and Ham — Salad Cream with a Pub Salad

Irish Pub Salad in the USA

I do enjoy a good Cobb salad, a Chinese tossed salad, or a mixed green American ensemble, and modern Ireland has embraced every kind of French, Asian and Italian salad you can dream of.

However, I must admit I'm still very partial to a good old traditional Irish salad.

This salad is often called an Irish pub salad. Variations of traditional Irish salads are served in Irish pubs throughout the United States.

And so today, I thought I might introduce you to the salad plates our Irish mothers and grandmothers served for decades. And who knows this little tutorial may come in handy for younger Irish mothers who may wish to rediscover how Irish salads were made many moons ago.

So let's get to it and learn how to assemble an Irish salad. No cooking required here, just some very specific Irish ingredient choices.

Essential Ingredients For An Irish Salad Plate

Let's start by discussing essential salad elements and then we'll review some optional choices. The following ingredients are used 99% of the time when creating this Irish summertime salad plate.

Choose a fairly large plate for your salad. It's nice to be able to place each ingredient so it can be seen and not covered by other ingredients. This salad is ususally served on indivdual plates rather than on one large platter for sharing.

Lettuce Leaves

The lettuce used in Ireland for this salad is a soft leaf butter lettuce also known as Bibb or Boston lettuce. Here in the United States it is often sold under the label live lettuce and it comes with its root intact for longer lasting lettuce.

The soft, tender leaves make a perfect bed for the other ingredients in an Irish salad.

Use about two to three full leaves per plate. Wash and dry the leaves first, then lay them straight down on the plate. No chopping or shredding required.

Hard Boiled Eggs

One hard boiled egg is usually served per person, quartered and not sliced or mashed.

It's very important there's no black ring around the yolk of your hard boiled eggs - they look so much more appealing when boiled to perfection.

Lay the egg quarters on the plate beside the lettuce leaves.

Cold Sliced Ham or Turkey

Cold cuts are the next essential.

Sliced ham is usually the meat of choice, but cold, sliced turkey breast is often used.

Rolled deli turkey and ham on an Irish pub salad. — Deli Meats

The key to meat presentation for an Irish salad is rolling the meat slices.

I used two rolled slices of deli turkey and one rolled slice of ham, but it's totally up to you to decide how much meat is your perfect portion size.

Tomatoes

A medium sized vine ripened tomato is best to replicate an Irish salad in the US.

The tomato is quartered rather than sliced or diced. Remember to remove the little green stem portion.

For presentation purposes simply lay the tomato wedges on the plate beside the meat.

Grated Cheddar Cheese

Cheddar cheese is recommended for this dish, and if you can get your hands on some tangy Irish cheddar like Dubliner cheese, then all the better.

Irish cheddar is far stronger and sharper than American varieties.

Grated white cheddar cheese is served as a part of an Irish salad — Grated Cheese

Grate the cheese and place a spoonful or two on the plate beside the eggs and ham.

No sprinkling the cheese over the top. The Irish salad eater gets to decide how to combine ingredients on the fork for each and every bite. I'll explain our "back of the fork" eating technique after we've assembled our salads.

Sliced Cucumber

Sliced cucumber is often used to add a little extra to this salad.

Be sure to use an English cucumber not the American varieties. These are sometimes called hothouse or seedless cucumbers.

Peeled sliced cucumber — Sliced Cucumber

I like to peel the cucumber before slicing it for this salad.

Add 5 to 6 slices of cucumber on each plate.

Optional Ingredients

Now it's time to chose a few more ingredients which I consider to be optional and dependent upon your own salad palate.

I'll start by introducing the optional ingredients I picked for my Irish summer salad.

Sliced Pickled Beets

Jars of sliced pickled beets are readily available in Ireland, just like in US grocery stores.

For this salad place two or three slices of drained beets on the plate if the beet rounds are large, but if they're smaller, like in the jar of beets I used, then six or seven slices is good.

I love the dark purple color these add to the dish.

Coleslaw

A spoon of coleslaw adds a great flavor profile. However, to truly be a taste of Ireland, I recommend using creamy Irish style coleslaw.

It does not have vinegar like most American coleslaw recipes.

A serving of creamy Irish coleslaw on an Irish pub salad. — Coleslaw

A spoon or two of coleslaw is perfect for each plate.

Here's the link for my Creamy Irish Style Coleslaw, where you can learn all about what makes Irish coleslaw different to American slaw.

Potato Salad

A spoon of potato salad is next, but my pick is no ordinary chopped American potato salad.

I choose Irish style, mashed potato salad. The kind I grew up on - easily whipped together using left over mashed potatoes.

Mashed potato salad on an Irish salad or pub salad. — Potato Salad

Add a small amount of potato salad to each plate.

My Irish mashed potato salad is made by mixing mashed potato seasoned with salt and pepper, with mayonnaise, a little sour cream and chopped chives.

Eating this creamy cool potato mix simply makes me nostalgic.

Mayonnaise or Salad Cream

Now it's time for our Irish salad dressing. No fancy concoctions required here. A simple spoon of mayonnaise is placed on the plate. Alternatively salad cream can be used, a favorite dressing for many Irish people.

A bottle of Heinz salad cream beside a plate of Irish salad. — Salad Cream

Salad cream is a distinctively Irish and British alternative to mayonnaise with a slight hint of vinegar.

I choose mayonnaise, but my husband is a salad cream kind of Irish man, so it's an essential condiment in our house for sandwiches and salads.

And that's how I built my Irish salad.

A Few More Ingredient Choices

Now if you would prefer an alternative ingredient to one or two ingredients in my Irish style pub salad, then here are some other options....

Cottage Cheese

Dieters sometimes replace cheddar cheese, which I consider essential, with cottage cheese for its more appealing calorific profile.

Feel free to add a dollop of cottage cheese instead of, or even together with the cheddar, but only if you like the curdy stuff.

Smoked Salmon

Slices of smoked salmon are sometimes chosen as a substitute for cold cuts. An expensive choice, but my daughter loves this delicacy.

She'll take smoked salmon any day over cold slices of ham. It's her Irish taste buds taking over.

Chopped Scallions (Green Onions) or Chives

If you like an onion zing to your salad, wash and dice up a few green onions. We call them scallions in Ireland. Place a little pile on the plate so salad eaters can add a few pieces to each combination bite they piece together.

An alternative to green onions is chopped fresh chives. Simply add a little pile of chives. No need to sprinkle them all over the ingredients on the plate.

Carrot and Raisin Salad

Carrot and raisin salad is another favorite option for an Irish salad plate.

Choose it to compliment potato salad or instead of coleslaw. This mixed salad features in many Irish restaurants to accompany quiche or as a side salad.

Pasta salad, or a Moroccan couscous salad are delicious too.

And you can even add a little tuna instead of the deli meat, spinach or watercress instead of lettuce, celery instead of beetroot, blue cheese instead of cheddar.

You get the idea? The choices are endless. Let your imagination run wild. The key is not to mix the salad components.

Lettuce, eggs, meat, tomato, cheese, cucumber, beetroot,coleslaw and potato salad with mayonnaise on an Irish salad plate. — Irish Salad Plate

Getting Creative with Salad

And there you have it! All the essential and optional ingredients required to assemble an Irish salad plate. And once you've created your masterpiece, you simply have to eat it.

Now Irish people tend to hold a fork upside down in their left hands when eating a salad.

Using a knife, they add a few morsels from a selection of the salad ingredients, onto the back of a fork, creating a slightly different flavor profile in each and every bite.

Eating an Irish salad by placing ingredients on the back of a fork. — Eating salad using the back of a fork

I hope you get the picture. That's the unique back of the fork eating method used all over Ireland and the UK.

Or maybe it's the correct way to hold cutlery. Or should I say silverware????? 🙂 🙂 🙂

Recipe Card for Irish Salad

Here's a printable recipe. This recipe ingredient list is for just one serving to keep it simple.

Irish Salad

An Irish Pub Salad is an assortment of green lettuce, boiled eggs, tomato, cucumber, grated cheddar cheese and deli meats plus a few extra optional ingredients such as pickled beets, coleslaw or potato salad.

5 from 6 votes

Print Pin Rate

Course: Salad

Cuisine: Irish

Keyword: Irish Salad, Pub Salad, Salad Plate

Prep Time: 10

Total Time: 10

Servings: serving

Calories: 668kcal

Ingredients

3 leaves butter lettuce
1 hard boiled egg
3 slices deli sliced ham and/or turkey
1 medium tomato vine ripened
¼ cup cheddar cheese grated
1 tablespoon mayonnaise 1 dessert spoon in Ireland and salad cream can be substituted.
CHOOSE 3 TO 4 ITEMS FROM THE FOLLOWING....
6 slices English cucumber peeled
4 slices pickled beets.
2 tablespoons coleslaw 2 dessert spoons in Ireland.
2 tablespoons potato salad 2 dessert spoons in Ireland.
2 tablespoons cottage cheese 2 dessert spoons in Ireland.
2 tablespoons carrot and raisin salad 2 dessert spoons in Ireland.
2 tablespoons green onions chopped

US Customary - Metric

Instructions

Wash and dry the lettuce leaves.
Clean the tomato and cut into wedges or quarters.
Quarter the hard boiled eggs.
Peel a 3 inch section of an English cucumber and slice.
Roll the slices of deli meat.
Place the lettuce leaves on a dinner plate.
Add each ingredient on top of the lettuce leaves, arranging in a circle around the plate.
Do not toss the ingredients before serving.

Notes

The calories quoted includes coleslaw, potato salad, cottage cheese, carrot and raisin salad plus green onions as the optional choices. A lighter salad can be made by choosing less additions.

Nutrition Facts

Irish Salad

Amount Per Serving (300 g)

Calories 668 Calories from Fat 369

% Daily Value*

Fat 41g63%

Saturated Fat 14g88%

Polyunsaturated Fat 1g

Monounsaturated Fat 5g

Cholesterol 283mg94%

Sodium 1639mg71%

Potassium 1847mg53%

Carbohydrates 41g14%

Fiber 7g29%

Sugar 20g22%

Protein 39g78%

Vitamin A 3833IU77%

Vitamin C 54mg65%

Calcium 394mg39%

Iron 11mg61%

* Percent Daily Values are based on a 2000 calorie diet.

Nutrition Information is estimated based on the ingredients and cooking instructions as described in each recipe and is intended to be used for informational purposes only. Please note that nutrition details may vary based on methods of preparation, origin and freshness of ingredients used.

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For extra servings you can do the math. Simply multiply the ingredient quantities by the number of people you wish to treat to a delicious Irish salad.