Summer Salad Veggie Sandwich Recipe
For many people, there are few things in life more satisfying than a well-constructed sandwich. All of your favorite ingredients — meat, cheese, veggies, condiments, and special sauces — piled together between 2 slices of good bread. If you're a vegetarian, trying to incorporate more veggies in your life, or looking for a meat-free Monday option, you might be getting a little tired of cheese sandwiches. Plus, cheese is all very well if you're lacto-vegetarian, but won't do you much good if you're vegan, and let's face it, vegan cheese isn't everyone's cup of tea. You know what makes a better plant-based protein source for a homemade veggie sandwich? Hummus, which is what developer Annabelle Randles uses in this recipe.
Hummus is super-nutritious, bringing both fiber and iron to the table as well as protein. It's as tasty as it is nutritious, too, with a smooth, creamy texture and nutty, tangy flavor, full of garlic, lemon, and whatever spices or flavorings you choose to add. In this summery sandwich, though, the hummus isn't center stage, but instead plays backup to a stellar lineup of vegetables: creamy avocado, sweet bell pepper and carrots, crunchy cucumber, piquant onion, juicy tomato, and peppery watercress. One bite in, and you can check off "eat the rainbow" from your daily to-do list. After two bites, you might even find yourself with a new favorite sandwich.
Assemble the ingredients for the summer salad veggie sandwich
For the filling, you'll be using hummus (store-bought or homemade), watercress, tomatoes, bell peppers, avocados, red onions, cucumbers, and carrots. Add a few slices of bread, and you've got yourself a sandwich.
Step 1: Spread the bread with hummus
Spread some hummus on 2 slices of bread.
Step 2: Add some watercress
Pile a quarter of the watercress on top of the hummus on one slice of bread.
Step 3: Top with tomatoes
Top with 3 tomato slices.
Step 4: Pile on the peppers
Top with half of the bell pepper slices.
Step 5: Add the avocado
Top with half of the avocado.
Step 6: And also the onion
Top with half of the red onion.
Step 7: Layer on some cucumber
Top with half of the cucumber.
Step 8: Cover it with carrots
Top with half of the carrots.
Step 9: Add more watercress
Top with a quarter of the watercress.
Step 10: Close the sandwich
Pressing gently, top with a second slice of bread, hummus side facing down.
Step 11: Make another sandwich
Repeat the process to make the second sandwich.
Step 12: Serve the sandwiches
Serve the sandwiches.
- 6 tablespoons of hummus
- 1 cup watercress
- 1 medium tomato, cut into 6 slices
- ½ small yellow bell pepper, finely sliced
- 1 small avocado, finely sliced
- ¼ red onion, finely sliced
- ¼ cucumber, shaved into thin slices
- ⅓ cup grated carrots
- 4 slices of bread
- Spread some hummus on 2 slices of bread.
- Pile a quarter of the watercress on top of the hummus on one slice of bread.
- Top with 3 tomato slices.
- Top with half of the bell pepper slices.
- Top with half of the avocado.
- Top with half of the red onion.
- Top with half of the cucumber.
- Top with half of the carrots.
- Top with a quarter of the watercress.
- Pressing gently, top with a second slice of bread, hummus side facing down.
- Repeat the process to make the second sandwich.
- Serve the sandwiches.
How can I customize this sandwich?
If you want to take this sandwich and make it your own, there are a number of different ways to go about tweaking it. For starters, you could swap the sliced bread for a pita pocket, naan, or a flour tortilla, or you could go low-carb with a lettuce leaf. You could also use a different selection of raw vegetables — exchange the watercress for arugula, replace the cucumber with a pickle (if you can find fermented ones, these are especially nutritious), or supplement the bell pepper with a few jalapeño slices.
One of the best ways to switch up the sandwich, though, is to use a flavored hummus. Okay, maybe not a dessert hummus, unless you're really into unusual sweet and savory flavor pairings, but roasted garlic, roasted red pepper, or pine nut hummus would all be great additions to this sandwich. If you're opting to use the homemade kind, check out our recipes for avocado, caramelized onion, and lemon hummus as well as the hummus-adjacent baba ganoush.
What can I serve with this sandwich?
What goes better with a sandwich than a bowl of soup? As this is a summer sandwich, a cold soup would make for the perfect pairing. Gazpacho may be one of the best-known chilled soups, but if you're a guacamole fan, you'll also love our avocado soup. In the mood for something sweet, savory, and slightly out of the ordinary? Try making cucumber-melon soup. If you're torn between pairing the sandwich with a soup or a salad, though, you could always split the difference with our chilled lettuce soup.
Since this sandwich is basically a summery salad between 2 slices of bread, to pair it with a salad you might go with something more substantial than vegetables alone. Our plantain and wild rice salad would make for a hearty meal in combination with this summery sandwich, as would a chickpea and roasted eggplant salad or grilled summer vegetable pasta salad. All of these salad recipes, as well as the soup ones listed above, can be 100% plant-based as long as you leave off any of the dairy toppings. If you want a super simple side for the sandwich, though, you can always just go with chips. Yes, of course, we have a recipe for homemade potato chips, as well as one for sweet potato chips made in the air fryer.