Vegetarian Chickpea Salad is creamy, tangy, and savoury. It’s perfect on toast, over some mixed greens, or on its own. Great for summer lunches and meal prep. It’s almost like eating potato salad but without any guilt!
This post contains amazon affiliate links which means if you make a purchase after clicking one of those links, I will receive a small commission.
This recipe was originally posted on August 31, 2015 and it is now updated with a lot more information, tips, variations, instructions, photos, and video.
Summer heat means that I do not want to stand at the stove and stir, so my current cooking style includes:
- Instant Pot Recipes
- Sheet Pan Recipes (Yes, I do not mind cooking in the oven in the summer as it means I don’t have to stand at the stove. Most of the sheet pan recipes that I make are from my cookbook, The Ultimate One-Pan Oven Cookbook)
- No Cook Recipes (I actually don’t have too many of these on my site)
So, this particular Vegetarian Chickpea Salad is one of those rare No Cook Recipes. It’s perfect to make in the summer because it requires no cooking and it’s also super easy and fast to make. If you have your dill already washed and dried, then this Chickpea Salad can be made in under 5 minutes!
This Chickpea Salad is perfect for lunch or dinner. It is a great meal prep recipe as it holds in the fridge really well for about 3-4 days. It is excellent to serve with some vegetables. It is also great in a sandwich or with crackers. Serve it over a bed of lettuce and you got yourself a very filling meal!
Ingredients to make Vegetarian Chickpea Salad
- Canned chickpeas
- Onion powder
- Cayenne pepper
- Dried chives
- Apple cider vinegar
- Dijon mustard
- Mayo – store-bough or homemade eggless mayo (if you use Vegan mayo then this Chickpea Salad will be Vegan)
- Dill
Add some mixed greens and toast to turn this Vegetarian Chickpea Salad into Chickpea Salad Sandwich.
How to make Chickpea Salad
Making this Chickpea Salad is super easy and takes almost no time.
- If your dill is not washed, then wash the dill and wrap it in paper towel to absorb the moisture.
- Drain the chickpeas.
- While the chickpeas are draining, measure out the rest of the ingredients.
- Chop the dill.
- Mix everything together, mashing some of the chickpeas with a fork. Enjoy!
NOTE: I usually follow my tip on How to Store Herbs so dill is usually already washed and dry. This way this recipe is even faster and easier to make.
Ingredients and variations for Chickpea Salad
- Canned chickpeas
- I prefer using no salt added chickpeas as I try to control my sodium intake.
- You can use regular chickpeas that have salt.
- Mayo
- You can use store-bought mayo.
- I love using my Homemade Eggless Mayonnaise.
- Mayo that I used in the video and showed in photos is my Homemade Eggless Mayonnaise with a lot of different herbs.
- You can use vegan mayo and this will make the Vegan Chickpea Salad.
- Onion powder
- There’s a lot of onion powder in the recipe, a whole tablespoon! It makes this Chickpea Salad extra savoury but (in my mind) it doesn’t taste too onion-y.
- Feel free to use less onion powder if you’d like.
- Cayenne pepper
- Cayenne pepper is an optional ingredient. I love a tiny bit of heat in this salad.
- You could use less or omit altogether.
- Alternatively you could use more if you like it hot.
- Dried chives
- I love this recipe because I almost always have all the ingredients in my kitchen.
- If you have fresh chives, feel free to use fresh but I rarely buy chives so I use dried chives as an easy alternative.
- Feel free to omit.
- Apple cider vinegar
- Vinegar adds a slight tang to this Chickpea Salad, making it wonderfully zingy and fresh.
- I love using Apple Cider Vinegar for its slight sweetness.
- You can use White Wine Vinegar or even just regular vinegar.
- Also, you could use lemon juice instead.
- Dijon mustard
- I highly recommend using Dijon mustard as opposed to regular yellow mustard as it has a very refined and smooth flavour.
- But you could use regular yellow mustard if that’s all you have available.
- Dill
- If you’ve been following my recipes for a while then you’ll notice that I have an affinity for using dill! I just love its freshness and flavour!
- You could use parsley or cilantro or tarragon instead.
Vegetarian Chickpea Salad
Ingredients
- 1 can Chickpeas, drained (540 ml)
- 1 tablespoon Onion powder
- 1/4 teaspoon Cayenne pepper (optional or less depending on how spicy you like it)
- 1 teaspoon Dried chives
- 1 teaspoon Apple cider vinegar
- 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
- 2 tablespoons Homemade eggless mayonnaise (or your favourite store-bought or vegan mayo)
- 1/4 cup Dill (finely chopped)
- Salt and pepper to taste
Instructions
- To make this salad in only 5 minutes, first wash the dill and wrap it in a paper towel to remove the moisture.
- Drain the chickpeas and leave them in a colander to drain more. You could rinse them also, I do it sometimes but not always.
- In a medium sized bowl, combine the onion powder, cayenne pepper, dried green onion, white wine vinegar, dijon mustard and mayo. Mix well.
- By this time the dill should get dry, so chop it finely.
- Add the well-drained chickpeas and mix with a fork, mashing half of the chickpeas with the fork. Add the chopped dill and mix.
- Serve on toast, with crackers or with vegetables.
Video
Nutrition
Mention or tag @Imagelicious
Old photos from 5 years ago 🙂
Julia Roberts says
Oh this one looks so tasty. I just want to have some of it right now
Imagelicious says
Thank you! It tastes delicious