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This Creamy Cucumber Salad is a refreshing side dish perfect for weeknight dinners or summer barbecues. You’ll love the creamy dill dressing!
Slightly sour with the perfect balance of creaminess and fresh herbs, you’ll love this recipe for how simple and perfectly delicious it is. Slice cucumbers and combine ingredients, great for a side, picnic or potluck accompaniment, summer bbqs, or snack. The pop and zing from the fresh lemon juice and dill weed are refreshing and wonderfully fresh.
How to Make Creamy Cucumber Salad
Making this creamy cucumber salad recipe isn’t too hard. The most important thing is using fresh ingredients for fresh flavor.
- To begin, slice the cucumbers and red onion and combine in a bowl. Do this using a sharp knife, however, if you want an even thinner end result, use a mandolin. Just remember, when you are using a mandolin you are taking your life in your hands. These things are SHARP.
- In a separate, small bowl, combine sour cream, lemon juice, salt, red wine vinegar, sugar, and dill to make the dressing.
- Pour the dressing you just created over the sliced cucumbers and onions and mix to combine.
- Cover and refrigerate the salad for 1 hour before serving.
Variations
The most simple variation is to make a creamy cucumber tomato salad by adding halved cherry tomatoes to the salad. These add a pop of color and a great flavor. Another variation you can try is plain Greek yogurt instead of sour cream. Maybe this wouldn’t taste as rich (or delicious) but you would still have that creamy texture with the tangy, sour taste.
What to Serve with Creamy Cucumber Salad
Enjoy your salad as a perfect barbeque side. The creamy, sour nature of it compliments meat excellently. Things you could serve with this would would be chicken or grilled chicken, any kind of pork, sticky bbq ribs, steak on the grill. The creaminess of the sauce on the cucumbers tames the burnt flavor of anything on the grill.
Frequently Asked Questions
This starts with salad prep. As you are making your salad, be sure to remove excess liquid from the cucumbers by sprinkling a little salt on the cucumbers, letting them sit for about 30 minutes, and then dab with a paper towel. This keeps the previously sopping wet cucumbers from releasing all their moisture into the salad.
After doing some research online, it looks like some people do this! I’m not sure how it would taste as mayo is so different from sour cream, and I’m not sure of the amount needed, but it’s certainly something you could experiment with!
Creamy cucumber salad is, as the name suggests, a cucumber based salad with a creamy dressing. Our dressing is kept simple, with sour cream, lemon, and dill. Some people dress it up with garlic powder and more, others have experimented with using a ranch dressing packet to add the flavor. The salad tastes creamy and slightly sour, but also fresh and tasty!
Read Next: 35+ Best BBQ Side Dishes
More Cucumber Recipes
Creamy Cucumber Salad
Ingredients
- 2 English cucumbers
- 1/2 red onion
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 2 tablespoons lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons red wine vinegar
- 1/2 teaspoon sugar
- 3 tablespoons fresh dill chopped
Instructions
- Slice the cucumbers into thin rounds and slice the red onion into small, thin strips. Combine in a bowl.
- In a small bowl, combine the rest of the ingredients to make the dressing.
- Pour the dressing over the cucumbers and onion and mix until everything is evenly coated.
- Cover and refrigerate for 1 hour before serving.
Notes
- To soften the flavor of the red onions, you can soak them in ice water for 10 minutes after slicing. Pat dry and then add to the salad.
- This salad is best served the day it is made, but it will last 1-2 days in the fridge.Â
- We used English cucumbers because they have a thinner peel and fewer seeds. However, you can use regular cucumbers or Persian cucumbers.Â
