Southwestern Chopped Salad - Iowa Girl Eats (2024)

This post may contain affiliate links.

Confession: my friends and I were regulars at allthechains in high school. TGI Fridays, Carlos o’Kelly’s, CHILI’S – nothing was safe! I re-created Chili’s spicy, slightly-thick bowls of Chicken Tortilla Soup way back in 2012 (!) and am back with another copycat recipe that I used to order there on the regular: Southwestern Chopped Salad (though they call theirs Sante Fe Chicken Salad.) Regardless of what you’re calling it, this salad is still stuffed with all the same tasty ingredients!

A base of thinly shredded romaine lettuce is tossed with local sweet corn, creamy black beans and avocado, plus fresh pico de gallo and crushed blue corn tortilla chips which not only add a fabulous color to this beautiful dish, but a salty, satisfying crunch. While Chili’s drizzles their salad with ranch dressing plus aspicy santa fe sauce, to keep things simple and low-fuss I dressed my salad in Salsa Ranch Dressingaka salsa mixed with, you guessed it, ranch dressing.

It’s the simple life over here, folks, won’t you join me?!

I’m telling you, this dishis a treatto eat. Savory, sweet, fresh, crunchy, creamy – totally interesting. Since this salad has black beans for protein and isenormous,I kept it meatless, but if you want to divy up the recipe amongst four people instead of two or three, add grilled chicken, shrimp, or steak on top and you’re set!

Start by mixing up a batch of fresh Pico de Gallo. Before makingmy own PdG I was totallyindifferent aboutthe oft overlooked condiment served in tiny plastic cups next to burritos and nachos which, in my experience, almost always wentuntouched. Homemade PdG though? INSANE. Ridiculously good in this salad and/or dunked into with tortilla chips. It’s just a mixof chopped tomatoes, white onion, jalapeno, cilantro, lime juice, and salt. Simple ingredients, tons of flavor.

Add your desired amount of pico de gallo (aka what’s left after attacking it with chips) to a big bowl with 9ozshredded or chopped romaine lettuce, the kernels from 2 ears sweet corn, and 1/2 cup black beansthen toss to combine.

Last step is to add 1 chopped avocado and a couple handfuls of crushed blue corn tortilla chipsthen drizzle with Salsa Ranch Dressing and toss again to combine. Scoop onto plates then dig in! I hope you enjoy this fresh and colorful summer feast!

Free Email Series

Dinner Made EASY

5 days of simple yet flavorful recipes that take the stress out of dinnertime!