Sides are the key stars of any Fourth of July meal, including pops of coloration, crunch, and taste that completely complement every thing from large grilled steaks to plant-based burgers. Truthfully, generally my favourite sort of celebration is all concerning the sides—a selection so good you barely miss the primary dish. Whether or not you’re grilling these sides recent or making them forward to serve chilled or at room temp, these recipes maintain up superbly, making them excellent for a sunny summer season day of consuming, chatting, and fireworks.
1. Asparagus With Lemon-Pepper Marinade From Bryant Terry
Will you be grilling this 4th of July? Then let your fundamental dish scoot over a bit to make room for some sides, like this vegan asparagus surprise the place the marinade turns into the sauce.
2. Pimento Cheese Biscuits
A handshake between two Southern favorites. In case your biscuits have been sitting at room temp for some time, you possibly can throw them on the grill for a fast reheat (and do the identical for all of the biscuits on this record).
3. Pasta Salad With Roasted Peppers, Inexperienced Olives, Walnuts & Anchovies
Combine up the colours of the peppers right here for a happy-looking pasta salad that’s huge on taste (just about the entire elements are within the title!).
4. Absolutely Grilled Caesar Salad
Make the dressing prematurely and all you need to do on the day of is grill the romaine hearts and bread earlier than serving.
5. Black Bean with Mango and Chile Powder Salad
This vibrant salad pairs black beans with candy mango and a smoky kick of chile powder for a daring, balanced chunk.
6. Adzuki Bean Salad With a Creamy Peanut Dressing
This Adzuki bean salad will get a scrumptious enhance from a creamy peanut dressing that’s wealthy however mild. It’s a easy, satisfying facet with an incredible stability of nutty and recent flavors.
7. Tomato Peach Panzanella
A straightforward bread salad that makes probably the most of juicy summer season tomatoes and ripe peaches. It’s candy, savory, and precisely what you wish to eat on a sizzling day.
8. Grilled Corn with Basil Butter
Don’t have basil? Use a distinct herb. Don’t have a meals processor? Soften the butter and blend by hand. Don’t have time? Make it prematurely and check out to not eat all of it earlier than July 4.
9. Grilled Peach, Halloumi & Mint “Caprese”
Caprese will get some cool new garments on this recipe that balances delicate ripe peaches with hearty halloumi.
10. Grilled Eggplant with Miso & Doenjang
These eggplants get a grill with out the sauce earlier than getting a grill with the sauce, serving to it maintain a powerful texture when served. If there’s no room on the grill (otherwise you don’t have a grill), use the oven.
11. Coleslaw
To mayo or to not mayo? This recipe says sure—however sparsely, together with Greek yogurt and cider vinegar.
12. Grilled Marinated Tomatoes
For those who’re seeking to have crimson, white, and blue accents at your 4th of July get together, let this very seasonal dish care for the crimson.
13. Minnie Utsey’s No-Fail Cornbread
Sugar is the key ingredient right here. For those who can’t discover shortening, use softened butter.
14. Tacky Mushroom Bread
An Iowa banquet particular, this crowd-pleaser doesn’t contain making the loaf from scratch (however you are able to do that if you’d like!). If in case you have a barbecue, you may wrap the bread in foil as instructed and grill away.
15. Avocado Cornbread
Creamy avocado inside crispy cornbread? Signal me up.
16. Heirloom Tomato and Cornbread Panzanella
To American-iza panzanella, use cornbread as an alternative.
17. Arañitas With Garlicky Mayo-Ketchup
If you should utilize a field grater, you may make Puerto Rican arañitas, adobo-spiced plantain fritters.
18. Canal Home’s Marinated Zucchini
Make-ahead alert! This easy however kicky facet stays within the fridge for per week.
19. Nori Deviled Eggs
Aspect or appetizer? Maybe each, however all the time scrumptious.
20. Garlicky Roasted Potato Salad
Spanish patatas bravas get the potato salad therapy on this recipe (psst, you may roast the potatoes forward of time).
21. 3-Ingredient Bacon Biscuits
Let bacon prepared the ground in these skillet-made buttermilk biscuits.
22. Immediate Pot Baked Beans With Bacon
When planning a Fourth of July menu, one of many facet dishes has to be baked beans (in reality, I feel that’s written into the Declaration of Independence). However making baked beans from scratch is a time-consuming feat, so we made it even simpler by growing a recipe that may be made within the Immediate Pot.
23. Triple-Broccoli Pasta Salad
We love broccoli however we hate seeing the stalks go to waste, which is why we’re so grateful to Emma Laperruque, who developed this recipe for broccoli salad that makes use of the crowns and stalks of their entirety. “Broccoli stalks, that are all too usually thrown out, get shaved into curls and ribbons, then salted and rested till they wilt, just like the world’s quickest pickle,” she writes.
24. Sriracha-Lime Corn Salad
Contemporary corn is simply beginning to peak in some elements of the nation across the 4th of July, however that doesn’t imply we gained’t instantly spring into motion to get our arms on it and switch it into this potluck-friendly summer season facet dish.
25. Martha Stewart’s Macaroni & Cheese
Nobody will ever say no to mac and cheese, even on a sizzling summer season day just like the Fourth of July. That’s as a result of it goes so effectively with burgers, sizzling canines, and ribs…plus, it’s vegetarian-friendly!
26. Tomato Cucumber Salad With Fried Capers
Whether or not you grew them your self or stocked up on the farmers’ market, this is among the finest makes use of of colourful heirloom tomatoes and cucumbers. They’re tossed with recent dill, fried capers, and a contact of sherry vinegar for a fast and straightforward summer season salad.
27. Summer time Farro Salad
Our readers name this their favourite use of recent mozzarella, however we name it our favourite fourth of July facet dish recipe. It comes collectively within the blink of an eye fixed and is jam-packed with recent parsley and basil, kalamata olives, grape tomatoes, and a candy honey French dressing.
28. Potato Salad With Celery & Arduous-Boiled Eggs
You may’t have a cookout—particularly a fourth of July bash—with out potato salad, and this one is as traditional because it will get. We discovered that waxy Yukon gold or crimson potatoes held their form higher than russets towards the mustard-mayo dressing.
29. Home made Potato Chips
The fourth of July wants some quantity of shock and awe—serving your company do-it-yourself potato chips will definitely do the trick.
30. Grilled Marinated Tomatoes
A make-ahead facet dish that makes use of summer season’s shining star—tomatoes! They’re grilled barely after which wearing a fish sauce marinade.
31. Marcy Ragan’s Grilled Panzanella Caprese
Three Italian-ish staples—Caprese salad, bruschetta, and Panzanella—staff as much as make this crowd-friendly salad that’s destined to be part of your summer season unfold.
32. Smoky Eggplant With Whipped Ricotta & Pistachios
Eggplant is at its peak in July and when grilled, it transforms right into a smoky-slightly candy facet dish.
33. Roberto Santibañez’ Traditional Guacamole
Irrespective of the time of yr, each get together wants guacamole (is it a celebration if there isn’t guac)? This recipe is about as conventional as they arrive, which makes it that rather more scrumptious and reliable.
34. Grilled Inexperienced Onion Dip (Charred Scallion Dip)
You will discover inexperienced onions year-round, however they’re by no means precisely thrilling. We’re taking issues into our personal arms by placing them heart stage. They’re grilled after which instantly put within the meals processor, together with a little bit little bit of bitter cream.
35. Spicy Watermelon With Tomatoes, Prosciutto & Salted-Lime Yogurt
Watermelon doesn’t simply belong in a fruit salad. In reality, this facet dish teeters on the sting of one thing savory.
Which dishes will you be making this 4th of July? Pontificate within the feedback!
This text was up to date in July 2025 by our editors as a result of we love sides.