Three Bean Salad {Portion Fix/21 Day Fix}

This old fashioned Three Bean Salad is a perfect side dish at any BBQ or picnic! The vinegar-based dressing makes it easier to keep cool outside!

What kind of beans do you use for a Three Bean Salad?

There are plenty of oddball recipes out there that use every kind of bean known to man. But the classic old fashioned Three Bean Salad uses cut green beans, cut wax beans, and red kidney beans. They are all canned beans, which is great right now when fresh options for veggies can be a challenge.

Canned beans can be high in sodium though. You can readily find cut green beans with no added salt but wax beans and kidney beans with no salt is impossible to find.  I have a trick to leech some of the salt out of them though!

I drain the juice out of the can and run water over my strainer full of beans. Then I soak them in warm water while I get the rest of my salad together.  Some recipes call for cold beans and warm dressing, I just flip flop that warm beans and cold dressing! 

The standard can of cut green beans and wax beans has about 1 1/2 cups in it or 3 Green containers. Kidney beans are shaped differently and a little firmer so they only have about 1 cup of beans in it or 2 Yellow containers.  I dry the beans between 2 clean dish towels to get all of the water off of them so that the dressing won’t be watered down. 

                       

I am making 4 servings of this so I am going to add 1 more Green container of ingredients so that the “math” is easier.

A cup of mixed fresh veggies gives this salad some crunch. I like a mix of onion, celery, and bell peppers to complement the dressing. 

Dressing a classic Three Bean Salad

A simple vinegarette is all you need to dress this salad. I am going to make 8 tablespoons of dressing in total.  That is 2 tablespoons per serving of salad or 1 Orange container. Because this is one of those “marinating” salads some of the dressing is going to be left in the bowl when you serve it. I usually just count 1/2 Orange container for my day because of it. 

I add my veggies and my dressing to a gallon ziplock bag or a bowl with a spillproof lid. Toss them in and seal it, then toss it around for a minute and stick in the fridge for the day. Every time I open the fridge I just turn the bag of toss the bowl. I like to make it the day before or early in the morn and let it marinate. But even if I stir it up in the afternoon the vinegar will bring a twang to it! 

What can you serve this Three Bean Salad with?

I love the twang of the salad with a good bbq pork sandwich. Here is a great recipe for Pulled Pork with Maple BBQ Sauce. 

And this is one of my favorite salad to take on a picnic. I have another great vinegar-based salad in this post about picnicking.