Watermelon & Feta Salad

As you guys have already noticed, summer is NOT my favourite season. I rant in summer. I’m cranky in summer. I snap, I am irritable and generally keep to myself to avoid any heat anger episodes 😀 I’m kidding, it’s not that bad, but I DO hate summer. And I do rant about the heat in summer which you guys might have already noticed from my posts 😉 But the fun me comes out when I get to cook some quintessentially summer-y dishes because at the end of the day, food just makes my life better. And bearable. 😉

I have decided that while I won’t restrict myself to only doing summer dishes, I will cook and share with you a lot of my favourite summer recipes, which will allow you to enjoy some fresh seasonal produce and also distract you a bit from the heat. Hah!

Watermelon and Feta is my favourite favourite summer salad. A gorgeous, fresh summer fruit married to one of the most versatile cheeses ever. Watermelon and Feta is a match made in heaven. You guys must be wondering what I’m going on about. But truly, while this is not an uncommon salad or a flavour combination, there are so many different and easy ways to make this. Also, easy is the keyword here. This is probably the easiest salad ever with a super short list of ingredients.

I personally like my watermelon with a lot of feta, onions and olives. AND mint! Traditionally, pine nuts also form an important part of this salad because they add a texture, a nice crunch, but I didn’t use pine nuts in this recipe because honestly, my local food store didn’t have any in stock ;P But that’s not a dealbreaker and you can totally go ahead and gorge on this salad without any pine nuts.

Let’s move on to the recipe, shall we?

Watermelon & Feta Salad:

Serves 2 | Prep time: 10 min | Cook time: 5 min

Ingredients : 

For the salad-

Watermelon – 2 cups, cut into bite-sized pieces
Red onion – 1/2, medium sized, sliced thinly
Black Olives (pitted) – 5-6, sliced
Mint – 10-12 small leaves, washed
Feta Cheese – 2-3 tbsp, preferably, try to get your hands on crumbly feta rather than the creamy variety.
Balsamic Vinegar – 1/2 tsp (optional)

For the dressing-

Extra Virgin Olive Oil – 2 tbsps
Salt and pepper – to taste

Steps :

Whisk together some extra virgin olive oil and black pepper and set aside. In a mixing bowl, get watermelon, olives and onion together and give it a very gentle mix. Pour over the dressing and mix once again ever so slightly. In a serving plate/bowl, place the watermelon, olive and onion and them crumble over some fresh feta. Place some tiny mint leaves on top as garnish. Drizzle over some balsamic vinegar and voila!

Stick your fork in and (try to) enjoy the summer! 🙂