Southwestern Bean Salad
on Mar 14, 2022, Updated Jul 04, 2024
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This Southwestern Bean Salad is made with black beans, kidney beans, corn, tomatoes and chunks of avocado. It’s a flavorful and easy side dish to have with your next dinner or to take to cookouts this summer!
I love making bean salads to serve as a side dish with dinner. They’re hearty, flavorful, and hold up well for a few days too.
I have several bean salads that you should definitely try out. This black bean and corn salsa salad has been one of my favorites for a long time. I actually used it as inspiration when I was making this Southwestern Bean Salad.
The great thing about this bean salad is that you can serve it with any type of protein. It’s a great salad to make any time of year and one that transports well to bring to your next barbecue or potluck.
Ingredients For Southwestern Bean Salad
- canned black beans
- canned kidney beans
- frozen corn – fresh or grilled corn would be great to use in the summer.
- cilantro
- green onion
- tomatoes
- jalapeño – if you want the salad to be spicy leave in the seeds and don’t devein it.
- pepitas – often labeled as pumpkin seeds.
- avocado
- lime
- honey
- chili powder and ground cumin
How To Make Southwestern Bean Salad
This is such an easy salad to make. Start by prepping your vegetables. Dice the tomatoes, but first deseed them so you don’t have a bunch of excess liquid in the salad.
Slice the green onions thin and finely chop the jalapeño, removing the vein and seeds if you don’t want the additional heat.
Rinse and drain the black beans and kidney beans and add them to a large serving bowl. Add in the tomatoes, jalapeño, green onion, corn, chopped cilantro, and pepitas.
In a jar or glass measuring cup whisk together the lime juice, honey, chili powder, cumin, olive oil, salt and pepper. Pour it over the salad and gently toss it together.
Add the avocado to the salad last so that it doesn’t get all mashed up. To help keep the avocado from turning brown I like to squeeze lime juice over it.
Ingredient Substitutions
- Kidney bean can be substituted with a second can of black beans or you could also use pinto beans.
- If you don’t like tomatoes or they don’t look good, substitute with a red bell pepper
- If you don’t like any spice in your food, omit the jalapeño or replace it with a milder chile such as a poblano or Anaheim chile.
- Green onion can be replaced with diced red onion. Doing this will give the salad a stronger onion flavor.
- To make this a vegan bean salad, substitute the honey with maple syrup.
- If you don’t like cilantro, omit it or substitute with parsley. Personally I would just omit it, as I don’t think parsley and cilantro have similar flavor profiles.
Storing Leftover Bean Salad
This salad will keep for up to 3 days in an airtight container in the refrigerator. Since there is avocado in the salad it will likely oxidize and brown after the day it’s made. I find this salad is best the day it’s made.
Ways To Use Leftover Salad
- Serve it as a salsa with tortilla chips or a topping for nachos.
- Use it as a for quesadillas, tacos, or lettuce wraps. Drain off as much of the excess liquid as you can if you do this.
- Add it into an omelette for breakfast
What To Serve With Southwestern Bean Salad
More Bean Recipes To Try
Did you make this Southwestern Bean Salad? I’d love if you’d leave a recipe rating and review below.
Southwestern Bean Salad
Ingredients
- 15 ounce can low sodium black beans rinsed and drained
- 15 ounce can low sodium kidney beans rinsed and drained
- 2 tomatoes seeded and diced
- 3/4 cup defrosted frozen corn
- 1/4 cup chopped cilantro
- 2 green onion sliced thin
- 1 jalapeño seeded, deveined, and finely diced
- 3 tablespoons pepitas
- 1 avocado peeled and diced
- 1/4 cup fresh unsweetened lime juice
- 2 tablespoons olive oil
- 1 1/2 tablespoons honey
- 1/2 teaspoon chili powder
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cumin
- Salt and fresh ground black pepper to taste
Instructions
- Add the beans, tomatoes, corn, cilantro, green onion, jalapeño, and pepitas to a large bowl.
- In a jar or glass measuring cup, combine the lime juice, honey, chili powder, cumin, salt, pepper, and olive oil. Shake or whisk the vinaigrette until well combined. Pour it over the salad and stir until everything is combined.
- Add in the diced avocado and gently fold it into the salad being careful not to break it up. Taste for seasoning and serve.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
