This refreshing, crunchy cucumber salad with pickled onions and fresh dill has just the right hint of sweetness and tang to make it the perfect side dish!
When the weather warms up it’s time to get serious about barbecue, picnics, and fun gatherings filled with food. All of this means lots of side dishes that are low on prep time but big on flavor.
This cucumber salad recipe is full of fresh flavor, lots of crunch and a won’t leave you feeling weighed down after a big portion.
How to Make Cucumber Salad
- Add water and vinegar to a medium pot.
- Add sugar.
- Place pot on medium high heat and stir until sugar is dissolved, then remove from heat.
- Halve and thinly slice one small red onion.
- Place onion sliced in the vinegar solution, mix and set aside.
- Remove some skin from the cucumbers. This is optional but I like the added visual interest of the striped side.
- Thinly slice the English cucumbers.
- Place cucumbers in a large bowl, sprinkle with salt and toss then cover and chill for 30-40 minutes.
- Drain excess juice from cucumbers.
- Chop the fresh dill and mint.
- Pour dressing and onions on cucumbers.
- Sprinkle with dill and mint. Toss and serve.
How do you Sweat Cucumbers?
Sweating cucumbers releases excess water so whatever dish you use them in doesn’t end up in a pool of liquid. The whole process is quite easy but does require some resting time.
Toss your sliced cucumbers in salt, cover and allow to res in the refrigerator for about 40 minutes. Drain liquid and you’re done! As a general rule I would recommend using 1/2 tsp per cucumber.
How long will this cucumber salad keep?
This cucumber salad is best within a few hours of making it. It will keep for 2 days in the fridge but the texture begins to suffer as the cucumbers loose more of their turgidity. You can however make the dressing 3 days and store in advance and store in the fridge to lessen the prep work the day of.
What can you do with cucumbers?
If you love cucumbers try some of these recipes out!
Pro Tips for making this cucumber salad recipe
- Sweat your cucumbers out! This will reduce the amount of water in them and yield a taster, less watered down salad that keeps longer.
- English cucumbers are a bit more delicate and have a thinner skin. If you can’t find them or don’t want to pay the surcharge, then use regular cucumbers and pell off all that waxy skin.
- Try serving the salad with nice croutons for added crunch, carbs and general loveliness.
- If you ever want to season some plain rice try tossing it with the dressing from this recipe, it’s really delicious.
- This recipe lents itself really to fresh garden flavors so feel free to experiment with favorite herbs like thyme, oregano and tarragon.
If you’ve tried this cucumber salad recipe then don’t forget to leave a rating and let me know how you got on in the comments below, I love hearing from you!
Cucumber Salad
Ingredients
For the Dressing:
- 1/4 cup water 60mL
- 1/2 cup vinegar 120mL
- 1/3 cup sugar 78mL
- 1 1/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp black pepper
For the Salad
- 2 English Cucumbers large
- 1 red onion small
- 1/4 cup dill fresh
- 3 tbsp mint
Instructions
- Add water, vinegar, and sugar to a medium pot. Place on medium high heat and stir until sugar is dissolved, then remove from heat.
- Halve and thinly slice one small red onion. Place onion sliced in the vinegar solution, mix and set aside.
- Remove some skin from the cucumbers leaving dark stripes. Thinly slice the English cucumbers.
- Place cucumbers in a large bowl, sprinkle with salt and toss then cover and chill for 30-40 minutes.
- After sufficient resting time drain excess juice from cucumbers.
- Chop the fresh dill and mint. Pour dressing and onions on cucumbers. Sprinkle with dill and mint. Toss and serve.
Video
Notes
- Sweat your cucumbers out! This will reduce the amount of water in them and yield a taster, less watered down salad that keeps longer.
- English cucumbers are a bit more delicate and have a thinner skin. If you can't find them or don't want to pay the surcharge, then use regular cucumbers and pell off all that waxy skin.
- Try serving the salad with nice croutons for added crunch, carbs and general loveliness.
- If you ever want to season some plain rice try tossing it with the dressing from this recipe, it's really delicious.
Good for health and yummy.
Wow, serendipity. Your recipe turned up in my blog roll the same morning two cucumbers turned up in my CSA bag, so I tried it. (Cucumbers are not a staple around our house.) It turned out really good! I don’t have dill in the herb bed, so I used thyme along with the mint—I expected it to be weird, but it wasn’t, it turned out sort of a really fresh bread-and-butter pickle flavor. This may solve the “what to bring to the potluck” problem I have now that everybody’s anti-carbs (and thus anti-Bundt.)
I have made this before and it was so delicious, that will make it again today, my family loves it,I did submit ed Keto sugar instead of regular sugar,!
So refreshing! I added shredded radishes and used coriander instead of mint. So good!
I’ve made this cucumber salad 4 or 5 times this summer. Perfect for the abundance of cucumbers in my garden. I took it to a fundraiser potluck last night and it was a smash hit. “Best cucumber salad I ever had” was a common compliment. I did leave out the dill as I could only find the plastic packages here in my area. As always, love your recipes and of course the videos.
Forgot to add the 5 star review to my earlier comment, so I’ll give this a ten star thank you for a great recipe.
thanks!