Food

This Chunky Guacamole Salad has all the ingredients in the classic Mexican avocado dip and makes a terrific side dish!

This Avocado Salad has its fair share of creamy ripe avocado chunks along with bell peppers, tomatoes and black beans. With a lime based salad dressing, the avocados stay green and the vibrant, flavorful healthy salad recipe is perfect for any Tex-Mex meal.

Chunky Guacamole Salad

Guacamole is one of my guilty pleasures. I try not to eat too many chips, but when there’s a big bowl of crisp tortilla chips and some spicy guacamole, my will power flies out the window. This a vocado salad recipe takes the traditional guacamole ingredients and serves them in a chunkier presentation. Plus, I couldn’t help but add some bell peppers and black beans to make it even heartier.

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Tips for Making this Chunky Guacamole Salad

This is one of those recipes you can tweak to make your own. Try chopping the veggies finer, and serving this chunky guacamole salad as a salsa with chips. Add some minced cilantro to the mix, too, if you’re not one of those folks whose genetics make cilantro taste like soap!

Without any heat in this avocado tomato salad other than a touch of cayenne in the dressing, it can definitely be spiced up. Adding diced jalapenos or even a couple pinches of red pepper flakes are easy ways to boost the heat.

If you’re making this guacamole salad recipe mid summer, substitute some chopped garden or heirloom tomatoes for the grape tomatoes . Tender fresh sweet corn cut right off the cob would be fabulous, too.

This avocado salad is healthy, full of vitamins and good fats, so there’s no need to be shy when taking a helping or when you go back for seconds. You’ll love this guacamole salad.

How Do You Keep an Avocado from Turning Brown?

If you’ve ever kept a bowl of guacamole in the refrigerator overnight, chances are that the exposed surface had oxidized, or turned brown. This is a chemical reaction that occurs when oxygen reacts with this delicious fruit. Not dangerous, but definitely not appealing!

There are a couple ways to keep your avocados, or guacamole for that matter, from turning brown. First, prevent air from reaching the surface of the avocados. This can be as simple as pressing plastic wrap directly over the surface of your guacamole or salad. With a chunky salad, though, keeping out all the air can be difficult.

Another method is to paint a neutral oil, like olive oil, over the exposed surfaces to block oxygen from the fruit. But the technique I use most is to use citrus juice or a citrus based salad dressing. The acidic pH of lemon or lime juice prevents the enzymatic reaction that causes the oxidation of apples, pears and avocados. This will help minimize browning until the juice is totally absorbs, so great for short term. Pro-Tip: Using Sprite or 7-Up as the acid on fruit like apples or bananas won’t give the tartness that fresh citrus juice imparts.

How to Cut an Avocado

As an avid avocado toast maker, I have become quite adept at cutting an avocado. Here is my method:

• Using a chef’s knife, insert and slice lengthwise going deep enough to hit the pit.
• Carefully rotate the avocado until you’ve cut around the whole avocado using the hard pit as a landmark.
• Twist the two halves apart.
• Use your knife to carefully whack the pit so the knife blade is wedged into the pit. Twist to remove the pit. PRO-Tip: place a hot pad on your palm to protect your hand from an accidental injury.
• To cut into cubes, cut a crosshatch pattern into both halves without removing the peel, then scoop out the flesh with a spoon. Cut any longer pieces into cubes.
• If you’d like to cut your avocado into slices, slice and remove the flesh with a spoon.
• Alternatively, peel off the avocado peel carefully, then place the avocado on a cutting board, flat side down, and slice. If you want cubes, then continue by cutting the slices into cubes. This is the method I use most frequently.

How to Ripen an Avocado

If you’re like me, there are those times your avocados are not soft enough for guacamole or salads. There are a couple ways to speed up the ripening process. Though it will take a day or two, it’s faster than waiting for nature to take its course.

• Place your avocado in a brown paper bag with fruit like a banana or an apple. The fruit will give off ethelyne gas which helps hasten the ripening. The bag helps keep the gas contained.
• Alternatively, keep your avocados in a warm spot in your kitchen to encourage ripening.
• The folks at Real Simple tested ripening avocados in a bag of rice, which worked well. I prefer the brown paper bag for ease of checking on the progress.

More Salads You’ll Love:

• Quinoa Black Bean Salad
• Citrus Spinach Salad with Avocados
• Greek Salad with Feta
• Fruity Chicken Salad
• Corn Tomato Basil Salad
• Summer Vegetable Salad
• Holiday Lettuce Salad
• Summer Panzanella Salad
• More Salad Recipes

This recipe was first shared in August, 2013 New photos and text were added in 2019.