Chopped Turkish Salad aka shepherd’s salad is packed with fresh summer flavors and Middle East spices. It is ready in 5 minutes and disappears that fast on a kebab platter.
This post was originally published in 2009. We’re now updating and republishing it with some changes.
Chopped Turkish Salad is said to be the most popular and traditional Turkish salad. Although we have it as a side dish with anything almost everyday in summer, it is mostly known as the Turkish salad for kebabs. The combination of lemon, vinegar and the spices (sumac and red pepper flakes) results in an extremely appetizing salad. I must warn you that it makes you eat more of whatever you pair it with. I don’t think you would complain about this though.
What to Eat with Chopped Turkish Salad
Today, chopped Turkish salad doesn’t belong to shepherds only, everyone in the country loves it because it’s super easy to make and super tasty. It is generally served with meat dishes like kebabs, meatballs, chicken dishes like Simple Roasted Chicken or even with a kind of pasta like this Pasta with Cheese and Meat Sauce. Also, chopped Turkish salad is served before the main dish in restaurants to keep the customers busy with the salad while they are waiting for their order.
We love to dip a piece of bread in this salad. Although we don’t want to finish it before our kebab arrives on the table, it’s almost impossible to stop eating it. We sometimes order a second one to accompany our main course. And there is always extra vinegar and olive oil in bottles served on the table for those who want to add more of these in their salad.
Traditionally, chopped Turkish salad is served in a boat shaped dish and you can garnish it with a few olives before serving.
How to Make Turkish Salad Dressing
The dressing in this salad is quite versatile. There are two main ingredients: Freshly squeezed lemon juice and olive oil. You can’t think of the salad without these two. Although the other ingredients like vinegar and pomegranate molasses are optional, you can hardly see a person refusing to use these. The amount of the ingredients for dressing depends on personal taste. I want mine with lots of lemon juice and olive oil but with little vinegar and pomegranate molasses.
Turkish Spice for Salad
Traditionally sumac is a must in this salad, but you might see salads without any spices or dressing at some restaurants. They leave it to the customers and serve some spices and dressing ingredients on the table. You decide the amounts and add each into your salad. If you are at a kebab restaurant though, the salad is completely ready.
Sumac is a very special spice and you can’t just add it in the dressing. Sprinkle it over chopped onions and massage them with sumac. This removes their bitterness and gives them a nice pinkish color. We even have another salad with onion and sumac named Onion Salad.
If you don’t mint a little heat in your salad, you should add another great spice in your salad: red pepper flakes, which is my husband’s obsession. I think you can easily find these at Middle East markets.
There is another spice my mom loves to use in this salad is dried mint but I think it’s her personal creation. I use it when we don’t have fresh parsley on hand and love the taste, but it’s totally optional.
Origin of Chopped Turkish Salad
I think the original names of dishes are as important as their flavors, so I must start with a brief explanation on the local name of the chopped Turkish salad. This salad used to be the main dish of shepherds in Turkey.
In the past, a village had generally one shepherd and everyone entrusted their cattle to him. People in that village would give shepherds some foods they produced in return. These might be wheat, flour, vegetables, fruits, molasses, dairy products, etc. Although there are still people who pay their shepherds with such foods, paying money is more common today.
A shepherd hits the trail early in the morning and takes a bundle of food with him that includes tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers and onions (the basic ingredients of shepherd’s salad) and a little bread. All of these vegetables are grown in the village yard and the bread is of course made by the women of that village. He prepares a quick lunch with these. Maybe some cheese or olives accompany this easy chopped Turkish salad but nothing more.
More About Turkish Shepherds
A typical Turkish shepherd has a few dogs with him, and these dogs are called shepherd’s dog. This name is also the name of that breed of dog. They are the best friends of him as they help him control the herd. Also, if the shepherd falls asleep, the dogs become the guard of the herd and the shepherd. These dogs protect them from wild animals like wolves or thieves.
Another important characteristic of a typical Turkish shepherd is that he plays a special instrument called shepherd’s pipe (kaval in Turkish). This instrument is made of a plant like reed. Especially sheep and cows love the sound of kaval. The rhythm of its music is so important as it makes the animals more submissive. The shepherd plays a slow music when the animals are drinking (is it the right verb here?) water from a river and he plays a more rhythmic music while they are grazing.
Below is the old image in the original post.
Chopped Turkish Salad
A refreshing and tasty salad with just a handful of ingredients. Ready in 5 minutes!
- Prep Time: 5 minutes
- Total Time: 5 minutes
- Yield: 4
Ingredients
- 1 cup chopped tomatoes
- 1/4 cup chopped cucumber
- 2 green peppers, chopped
- 1 big onion, diced
- Half bunch of parsley
- 2 teaspoons sumac
- Olives to garnish, optional
Dressing:
- 1 lemon
- 1 tbsp vinegar
- 2 tbsp extra virgin olive oil
- 1 teaspoon pomegranate molasses, optional
- 1/2 teaspoon red pepper flakes
- Salt to taste
Instructions
- Put the chopped vegetables in a bowl. Dice the onion in the same way, but before adding them in the bowl, massage them with sumac.
- Chop parsley and mix all of them.
- To prepare the dressing, whisk together the lemon juice, vinegar, olive oil, pomegranate molasses, red pepper flakes and salt. Pour it over the salad and give it a good stir. Serve immediately.
Note: I would like to thank to Tangled Noodle, one of my blogger friends. She honored me so much not only by trying one of my recipes but also by writing on my blog in details in her last post, Food By Friends: Give Recipe. I felt like a famous cook when reading her post. My cheeks got red many times each time I read a nice word there. So many thanks to her for starting her series of ‘Food by Friends’ with my blog. She shares her observations and experiences related to food. Reading her posts is always so enjoyable and informative for me. I learn even some ethnic dishes of Philippines from her, but haven’t tried them yet as they always include an ingredient that I can’t find in Turkey. However, she shows in her blog that we can substitute these ingredients with similar ones, so I have more courage now to try one of her recipes. If you still don’t know her blog, go check it!
salam zerrin
what a delicious salad
thanks for sharing this recipe
am going to see the blog you talked about
kisses
Hi Zerrin,
Greeks make a very similar salad, called horiatiko salata (village salad), which gets ruined all around the world with piles of lettuce and poor-quality tomatoes…the tomatoes should be nice and juicy, because the best part is soaking up the juices in the bottom of the bowl with some bread!
Another dish that is both Turkish and Greek – hard to say who came up with it first, which I like, makes us stubborn Greeks admit we have more in common with Turks than we like to admit 😉
And yes, “drink” is the right verb 🙂
Another great recipe! I had to Google sumac an found http://www.thespicehouse.com/spices/powdered-sumac so I have to look if it is sold in the Netherlands.
This is yet another wonderful example of why your blog is so unique – shepherd’s salad by itself is a lovely dish but it is made even more special now that we understand what its background is. Some of the best food are those that come from very simple beginnings such as this – sustenance for those whose labors are not often recognized or appreciated as they should.
Thank you so much for mentioning my blog. It was my absolute pleasure to write about you and your site and every word is absolutely true and sincere. I have a full list of your recipes that I want to try and the next one will be a sweet dish! 😎
wonderful salad very healthful and tasty!
That a really healthy looking salad. Thanks for sharing that footage of the man playing the pipe. I’ve always been interested in musical instruments from around the world, so that was really cool to see one played.
One of my favorites:-) Love the history & the flute.
What a delicious sounding dish, and I love the addition of sumac (you know that’s a favorite of mine) The story behind the dish and the video really bring this post to light. I learned so much more beyond just a new recipe. Have you ever thought of being a teacher? =)
Lovely salad, just need to find my sumac supplier. 😎
What a beautiful salad, Zerrin!Healthy and delicious ingredients:)
Sounds like such a delightful salad and I loved learning the background of this dish!
I am having this everyday here in Jerusalem. I have it for breakfast, lunch and dinner. Yum!
Touria- It’s so simple, too. Go see Tangled Noodle’s great blog, I’m sure you’ll love it.
Stamatia- I didn’t know Greek has a similar salad, but I do know that we have lots of foods in common. Although lots of people want to ignore this, it’s inevitable to think that it’s a sign of sharing the same past in the same geography.
Jankovitch- I’m sure you’ll love sumac. It’s a great spice of nature that can substitute lemon. Hope you can find it. We generally use it in salads (coban salad, potato salad,etc).
Tangled- I do love to learn and talk on the background of dishes. Knowing their origins makes me love them more. And it’s a great pleasure to share them with others.
Hope you love that ‘sweet dish’ you try. Please feel free to ask any questions if you have.
Jessie- Thank you!
Jenn- The shepherd’s pipe looks so simple, but I’ve heard lots of variations from this old instrument. It’s like a symbol of shepherds and flocks.
Cajun- Hope you can find it!
Erica- Healthy, delicious and so simple!
Natasha, Soma- Thank you. This is one of the dishes that has a meaningful and funny name.
Elra- Although this salad is traditionally eaten at lunch and dinner with a main dish, I do love it at breakfast, too. It’s so refreshing!
Oyster- Believe or not, whenever I use sumac in my kitchen, I remember your love of it and your post on sumac (http://oysterfoodandculture.com/2009/02/11/special-ingredients-sumac/)
It has a wonderful flavor and combines very well with onion. It’s always a great pleasure for me to learn the culture and history part of dishes. I must have studied something like ‘food history’at university. I sometimes find myself talking on food and culture while teaching (for example ‘modals’) during the class 🙂
This is a great mix of fresh, crunchy veggies! The sumac sounds delicious in this. I have to make this next time we’re grilling kebabs.
I love how you start your posts with an explanation, history, or origin of the dish. For me, it really makes me appreciate a recipe even more if I know a little bit about it. This salad sounds really delicious and refreshing!
I agree that this looks a lot like Greek salad, which is one of my all-time favorites. Looks great! I really should get some sumac.
This is one of my favorite salads. So tasty.
What a colorful and flavorful salad Zerrin!
So perfect for summery days.
Love all the Turkish customs well explained by you!
Now go to twitter with it 🙂
Cheers!
Gera
Recipes mean so much more when we have the story behind the origin of the dish. As for the salad, I now have another use for the sumac that I finally managed to get hold of 🙂
It reminds me of RAKI(as long as the ingredients are fresh and from the uncle shepherd’s garden)!!!!
This is why I am a subscriber of your blog. Always healthy good looking salads and my husband loves everything I had cooked for him from your recipes. And now you had me looking for SUMAC!! Thanks for teaching me something new.
Have a great week!
This does look great and healthy! Thanks for sharing!
Merhabalar,
Yaz geldi mi soframızın olmazsa olmaz salatasıdır. Ne güzel anlatmışsın. Ellerine sağlık.. Güzel yorumun için de teşekkürler. Yorumlarımda sorun vardı site adreslerini göremediğim için ulaşamıyordum. Onun için cevaplamada geç kaldım. Sevgiler. Sağlıklı mutlu iyi yıllar dilerim…
interesting story! and the salad looks great 🙂
Hi Zerrin,
I came across your blog as I was researching about Shepperd Salad. I made this salad based on Sunny Anderson’s (Food Network) recipe last week, and now I am working on my post about it. I usually try to find out the story/origin of the food so I can write about it, and through google, I found your blog and the story of this salad. Thank you for sharing the story, and unknowingly to me, I now know and made two of the Turkish/Middle Eastern dishes. The other one is Circassian salad, which I found through Simply Recipes blog, and I love that chicken salad.
Again, thanks for sharing the story and nice meeting you 🙂
Looks similar to the Shopska Salad by the Bulgarians. Will be back for more….
I am so excited. Fixed this tonight and even my finicky son ate it. I had been trying to find a recipe for this that actually had some flavor. It seems that some Turkish eat this very bland. Had tasted this at a local restaurant and it was so flavorful. Never even heard of sumac–don’t know where to find it yet, but, even without it I was able to arrive at a very close version of the salad I have so been craving ever since that Valentine Dinner. (found that lemon zest and sea salt are concidered a substitute) Do remember the amazing flavor of the spice sprinkled along the edge of the plate being something I would definitely search for–hoping that is sumac! Thanks for sharing! Can’t wait to try some more!