This Mediterranean Shirazi salad is so fresh, simple, quick, and easy to make! It complements so many dishes and adds a lot of color and flavor to your meals. Uses very simple common ingredients, and ready in just 15 minutes.

Salad shirazi has two words: salad, which is what we call salad in Farsi and shirazi which means from Shiraz, a city in the south west of Iran. I can easily say Shiraz is one of the most beautiful cites in Iran. With all its flowers and amazing weather, Shiraz is a great place to visit in the springtime. 

The Ingredients

• Cucumber – normally crisp Persian cucumbers are used, but if you can’t find them (I rarely can) use an English cucumber instead, it has fewer seeds and thin skin so you don’t need to peel the cucumber.
• Tomatoes – pick a variety of tomatoes that are firm, not too juicy, too seedy, or over-ripe. I usually go for Roma, Campari, or salad tomatoes.
• Onion – red, white, or yellow.
• Dried mint – crushed dried mint is what’s used in Shirazi salad. If you can’t find it, you can easily make it by dehydrating some mint leaves and crushing them with your hands. You can substitute dried mint with half a cup of fresh chopped mint leaves.
• For the dressing, use extra virgin olive oil, lemon or lime, salt, and pepper.

• Parsley – not a typical ingredient in traditional Persian salad, but I like to add it.

HOW TO MAKE SALAD SHIRAZI

• Wash and dry the cucumbers, tomatoes and onion.
• Cut the cucumbers in half lengthwise. Then cut each half into 3-4 pieces lengthwise. Chop the cucumber finely. Add them to a large bowl.
• Cut the tomatoes in half, if they’re too seedy, discard the soft seedy part and slice the tomatoes into strips. Chop them finely and add them to the cucumbers. 
• Chop the red onion finely as well and add it to the cucumbers and tomatoes. Give everything a nice stir to combine. 
• Add in lemon juice, dried mint, salt and pepper. Stir to combine. Taste and add more lemon juice or salt if needed.