Our 7 Layer Salad is loaded with all your favorite salad toppings, sharp cheddar cheese, crispy bacon, grape tomatoes, green peas, and red onions. All on a bed of crunchy farm-fresh iceberg lettuce.
Now that’s a salad, your whole family will love!
Our 7 layer salad is the perfect side dish for summer barbecues and makes a delicious light lunch. It’s a great make-ahead recipe when you need to bring a dish to family gatherings or potlucks.
For the best presentation of our 7-layer salad, I prefer to serve it in a clear glass bowl (such as a trifle bowl) before mixing the salad ingredients together. That way, everyone gets to enjoy the beauty of the layered salad before savoring its deliciousness.
If you’re a salad lover like me, make sure to try our Waldorf Salad and Classic Wedge Salad.
Ingredients to make a 7-Layer Salad
Let’s start by gathering the necessary ingredients to prepare our 7-Layer Salad recipe. Culinary professionals refer to this as mise en Place, which means “everything in its Place.”
Setting up your ingredients not only helps speed up the cooking process but also ensures you have all the necessary ingredients on hand to make the recipe.
Can I Change Up the Ingredients?
Absolutely! We used iceberg lettuce in our recipe, but you can use romaine lettuce or a combination of your favorite leafy greens. Spring mix, baby spinach, and arugula would all be nice additions.
We used red onions because they have a milder flavor; however, you can substitute green onions or sweet onions if you prefer. If you’re not a fan of onions, feel free to leave them out.
We used a combination of mayonnaise and sour cream to make the creamy dressing, but you can use Greek yogurt as a substitute for either the mayo or sour cream. You can also use Miracle Whip as a substitute for the mayonnaise. Add pureed avocado to make a green goddess dressing.
Cheddar cheese is always a good addition to salads, but if you want to add a little more oomph to the recipe, consider adding bleu cheese or gorgonzola to the mix.
You can add other ingredients to the mix; red bell peppers, carrots, cucumbers, broccoli florets, radishes, olives, sugar snap peas, and croutons would all make delicious additions.
Add cooked chicken, diced ham, or turkey to make the seven-layer salad a complete meal. Serve it with crispy tortilla shells and seasoned ground beef to make a taco salad.
Ingredients to make the Dressing
I love this creamy dressing; it’s not only delicious as a salad dressing, but it makes a tasty spread for sandwiches. You can even mix it into tuna salad or chicken salad instead of mayonnaise.
How to Make a 7-Layer Salad
Follow along with my simple step-by-step instructions to learn how to make our 7-layer salad in your home kitchen.
- Add the mayonnaise, sour cream, parmesan cheese, apple cider vinegar, granulated sugar (or honey), garlic powder, table salt, and black pepper to a medium bowl.
- Mix to combine and adjust seasoning to taste. The dressing should be smooth and creamy.
*Cover the bowl with plastic wrap and refrigerate the dressing while you prepare the rest of the salad. Chilling the dressing helps the flavors blend. - Add the chopped iceberg lettuce to the bowl.
- Add the cherry tomato halves to the bowl.
- Add the green peas to the bowl.
- Add the diced red onions to the bowl.
Be sure to rinse the chopped lettuce thoroughly before use. Use paper towels to pat it dry, or use a salad spinner if you have one.
- Add the chopped hard-boiled eggs to the bowl.
- Add the dressing to the bowl and use a rubber spatula to smooth it across the top.
- Sprinkle the sharp cheddar cheese over the top of the dressing.
- Sprinkle the chopped cooked bacon over the top of the cheese.
Depending on how you prefer to serve the seven-layer salad, you can mix it together at serving time or scoop out the ingredients onto the plate without mixing. I like to mix it to get a good coating of the dressing on the salad ingredients.
Wouldn’t you love to sit down to this delicious seven-layer salad? It’s one of my all-time favorites, and I know it’s going to be one of yours too!
Store any leftover salad in the refrigerator in an airtight container or covered with plastic wrap for up to one day. It’s best eaten the day you make it.
Recipe FAQs
Absolutely, it can be prepared the night before, but don’t mix it together until just before serving. The dressing actually helps seal in the freshness.
Make sure to dry the lettuce as dry as possible and keep it at the bottom of the bowl.
Add ingredients with moisture, like tomatoes, peas, and onions, in the middle.
Add the dressing, then the cheese, and bacon. And always use a heavy mayonnaise-based dressing, not a vinaigrette.
More Recipes You’ll Love!
7 Layer Salad (Southern Classic)
Equipment
- large glass bowl
Ingredients
Salad
- 8 cups iceberg lettuce -chopped (or romaine)
- 10 ounces frozen peas -thawed (1 bag)
- 1 pint grape tomatoes – cut in half lengthways
- 1 ½ cups extra sharp cheddar cheese – -shredded (yellow for color)
- ¾ cup red onion – chopped
- 5 hard cooked eggs – chopped
- ½ pound bacon -cooked and chopped
Dressing
- ¾ cup mayonnaise
- ½ cup sour cream
- 2 tablespoons sugar (or honey)
- 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar
- ¼ cup Parmesan cheese – grated (or romano)
- ½ teaspoon table salt
- ½ teaspoon garlic powder
- ¼ teaspoon black pepper
Instructions
Dressing
- Add the mayonnaise, sour cream, parmesan cheese, apple cider vinegar, granulated sugar (or honey), garlic powder, table salt, and black pepper to a medium bowl. Mix to combine and adjust seasoning to taste. The dressing should be smooth and creamy.*Cover the bowl and refrigerate the dressing while you prepare the rest of the salad. Chilling the dressing helps the flavors blend.
Salad
- Cook the bacon, drain and chop.
- Make the hard cooked eggs, peel, cool and chop.
- Rinse, drain and chop the lettuce.
- Rinse the grape tomatoes and cut them in half lengthwise.
- Shred the cheese. I like to use yellow cheddar so it adds color to the salad.
- Chop the red onion.
- Defrost the peas.
Assembly:
- Fist layer – chopped lettuce.
- Second layer – tomato halves
- Third layer – peas
- Fourth layer – chopped onions
- Fifth layer – chopped eggs
- Bonus layer – dressing
- Sixth layer – shredded cheddar
- Seventh layer – chopped baconDon't mix the salad!
Notes
Add ingredients with moisture, like tomatoes, peas, and onions, in the middle.
Add the dressing, then the cheese, and bacon. And always use a heavy mayonnaise-based dressing, not a vinaigrette.
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