Whether you’re craving something extra healthy, are meal prepping, doing a cleanse, or just want a quick and easy salad recipe for busy weeknights, our vegan crunchy Detox Kale Salad Recipe comes together in just 10 minutes flat and stays fresh for days!
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Sometimes after a vacation, holidays, or just one-too-many cookies, we crave a nutrition reset. This big batch kale salad is perfect for those times where you’re feeling like you may have over-indulged just a bit…but you don’t want to do an extreme cleanse or detox. Oftentimes, all it takes to get back to feeling good is some extra water, sleep, and a big dose of healthy greens.
This vegan, big-batch superfood salad with kale is the perfect way to get your healthy diet back on track. Packed with the zesty flavors of turmeric, ginger, lemon, and cabbage, it boosts energy, reduces inflammation, and speeds up detoxification.
Best yet, it only takes 10 minutes to throw together and is hardy enough to stay fresh for days in the fridge — even when dressed — which makes it a great choice for busy weeknights or meal-prepping for the work week ahead.
Eat this crunchy, satisfying salad on its own, or pair it with a lean protein like shredded chicken, sesame-crusted snapper, or pan-seared salmon.
Why You’ll Love This Kale Salad Recipe
- Takes just 10 minutes start-to-finish!
- Stays fresh in the fridge for days, making it great for meal prep
- A delicious way to reset after you’ve overindulged
Healthy Kale Salad Recipe Ingredients
This big-batch healing salad is loaded with superfoods! Find ingredient notes (including substitutions and swaps) below.
- Lacinato kale – AKA dinosaur kale, this nutrient-dense green is the base of this salad
- Purple cabbage – antioxidant-rich purple cabbage adds major crunch.
- Cilantro – a bunch of cilantro gives this salad bright herbal flavor.
- Sunflower butter – this tasty butter made from sunflower seeds makes a creamy, slightly salty base for the dressing. We like SunButter brand.
- Apple cider vinegar – adds tang and probiotic power.
- Lemon juice – the juice of 2 lemons lends a punch of citrus.
- Coconut aminos – you’ll need 1 tablespoon of coconut aminos for this recipe.
- Ginger – freshly grated ginger adds a ton of flavor and antioxidants.
- Turmeric – this vibrant spice has anti-inflammatory powers.
- Honey – 1 tablespoon adds nice sweetness, but you can leave it out if you prefer.
- Sea salt – highlights all of the veggies and spices.
A full ingredient list with exact amounts can be found in the recipe card below.
Recipe Variations and Modifications
Here are some easy ways you can customize this salad:
- Greens – using kale is key to this recipe since the sturdy greens hold up to the acidic dressing without getting soggy. But you can use other types of kale other than lacinato if you’d like.
- Vinegar – if you don’t have apple cider vinegar on hand, you can use another type of vinegar, like red wine, sherry, or rice wine vinegar instead.
- Citrus – lemon juice adds nice brightness to this salad, but you could swap lime or Meyer lemon juice in its place.
- Nut/seed butter – if you can’t find sunflower seed butter, feel free to substitute another nut/seed butter like peanut, almond, cashew, hemp, or tahini. All would be delicious!
- Ginger – you can substitute 1 teaspoon dried ground ginger for fresh.
- Coconut aminos – you can replace the 1 tablespoon of coconut aminos with 1 teaspoon of tamari, but make sure you leave out the additional 1/4 teaspoon salt.
How to Make Kale Salad
Here’s how this superfood salad comes together in just 10 minutes:
Step 1: To make the dressing, add all of the ingredients from the sunflower butter to the sea salt together in a blender.
Step 2: Blend! If you need to thin the dressing, add in 1 tablespoon water at a time until the desired consistency is achieved.
Step 3: Place the shredded kale, cabbage, and cilantro in a large bowl.
Step 4: Thoroughly toss with the dressing and enjoy!
Kale Salad Recipe Tips
- De-stemming – removing the tough stems from the kale leaves is key to getting tender greens. Use a paring or chef’s knife to remove the ribs of the kale before you shred them.
- Shredding – to finely shred the kale and cabbage, you can either use your food processor, or a chef’s knife. If you go the manual route, use a chef’s trick to slice the kale leaves into thin ribbons (more on that below).
How to Serve
Eat immediately, or serve the salad chilled.
How to Store
Refrigerate the salad in an airtight container for up to 3 days. When you’re ready to serve it, give the container a shake or a stir to redistribute the dressing.
Frequently Asked Questions
You can absolutely eat kale in its raw form — it’s actually the best way to maximize its vitamin content, and antioxidant and inflammatory properties.
The biggest complaint about raw kale is that it can be tough. But slicing/shredding it thinly like in this recipe, and tossing it with an acid-based dressing that helps break it down, are the best ways to soften these healthy greens.
Nutritionally speaking, kale brings a lot to the table! Not only does it contain fiber, antioxidants, folate, calcium, vitamins C and K, and iron, but it also supports immunity and bone health, and helps lower LDL cholesterol.
To slice raw kale leaves, you can either use a food processor, or go the manual route with a chef’s knife. For the later route, use a chef’s trick to chiffonade the kale: stack a bunch of the leaves together, roll them up tightly into a cigar shape, and use your chef’s knife to slice them into thin ribbons.
More Favorite Salad Recipes
If you tried this recipe for Detox Kale Salad, or any other recipe on the Fed & Fit website, please leave a 🌟 star rating and let us know how it went in the 📝 comments below!
Detox Kale Salad
Ingredients
- 1/3 cup sunflower butter
- 4 tablespoons lemon juice, about 2 lemons
- 1 tablespoon coconut aminos
- 1-2 tablespoons water, or until you have desired thickness
- 2 teaspoons apple cider vinegar
- 1 tablespoon fresh grated ginger
- 1 tablespoon turmeric powder
- 1 tablespoon honey, optional
- 1/4 teaspoon sea salt, to taste
- 1 head lacinato kale, de-stemmed and shredded
- 1/2 head purple cabbage, shredded
- 1 bunch cilantro
Instructions
- Blend together all of the ingredients from the sunflower butter to the sea salt together until smooth. If you need to thin the dressing, add in 1 tablespoon water at a time until the desired consistency is achieved.
- Place the shredded kale, cabbage, and cilantro in a large bowl and toss with the dressing. Eat immediately or refrigerate up to 3 days.
Recipe Notes
- If you don’t have sunbutter, you can use any type of nut butter here. Almond, peanut, and cashew all work!
- You can substitute 1 teaspoon ground ginger for the tablespoon of fresh
- You can substitute the 1 tablespoon of coconut aminos with 1 teaspoon of tamari, but make sure you leave out the additional 1/4 teaspoon salt.
Nutrition
This salad is FROM HEAVEN. Do I make it every time my husband comes down with man-cold? I do. Do I buy sunflower butter only for this? I do. Did I like kale before this? I did not but now I do. Make the salad!!
This is delicious! The kale and cabbage are so crunchy and the dressing is very flavorful. It feels very fresh and nutritious.
Awe yay! We are so happy you love it, Kim!
Hi how much dressing is one serving ?
Hi Adrienne! You’ll toss the salad with all of the dressing. The nutrition facts are calculated for one serving, which would be about 1/8th of the salad. I hope that helps!
OMGosh! This is SUCH an awesome recipe! It’s such a nice change and has become a regular around here. That dressing…just SOOO good! Thank you!
Wahooo! So glad you love it, Hallie!
This was delicious! It felt so nice to eat something so healthy, but also so filling and flavorful! It was a breeze to make and the whole family enjoyed it! Even my 1 year old!
Score! That’s amazing, Danielle – we’re so glad the whole family loved it!
I love this salad! I made it the first time exactly as the recipe called for and the second time I used kale, slivered carrots and shaved Brussels sprouts and cilantro and it was just as crunchy and delicious!! I see myself making this over and over again in the future!!
Wahoo! That’s awesome, Kelli! Thanks for sharing this with us!!
Delicious! The dressing was flavorful and tangy. Definitely adding this to my mix of recipes to throw together at the beginning of the week and eat off of for a few days. I used 1/2c sunflower seeds instead of the butter. Dressing was a bit chunky, so next time I’ll blend it for a bit longer next time.
We’re so glad you enjoyed this salad, Rebecca! Thank you for sharing this with us!
Hi, no cilantro at grocery store! Can I sub parsley?
You can!
Love this salad. I definitely accidentally used one tablespoon of ground ginger rather then the substitute of 1 teaspoon for 1 tablespoon of fresh. It’s still good and will only be better once I get the recipe right! Ha!!
That’s a lot of ginger!! We’re so glad you love it though!!! Thanks for sharing this with us, Megan!
What exactly is tamari? I cant use the coconut aminos because my son has an allergy….
PS I love your cookbook and the Instagram stories showing step by step instructions for recipes! 🙂
Tamari is a gluten-free sub for soy sauce! You’ll find it near the soy sauce at the grocery store!
Roughly how many cups of Kale? My grocery delivery substituted a “bunch” of kale and it doesn’t look like much!
About 3 cups, Katie! You can totally make this salad with a little more or a little less though!
I don’t have sun-butter and am limiting my trips to the store at this time. Is there something I can substitute?
Peanut butter or almond butter should work in place of sunbutter!