Vegan salads do not have to be boring.
If you occasionally prepare meals for a vegan, you already understand the challenges of finding interesting recipes. Even a salad can be trying. For vegan preparation, you cannot freely toss in the items that make a salad more interesting to a carnivore, or even a vegetarian. Forget the grilled chicken breasts, bacon bits and anchovies. Step away from the blue cheese crumbles, garlic butter croutons, baked goat cheese and chopped eggs. Pile on the veggies instead.
Kale Avocado Salad
Tear a washed head of kale into bite-sized pieces. Dinosaur kale works well, but use whatever variety you prefer. Dump on top a nicely ripe peeled and pitted avocado, lemon juice, garlic, sea salt and olive oil. With clean hands, massage the ingredients into the kale, softening it in the process. Using a spoon, seed a large tomato. Chop it and add to the salad. Serve immediately. Use organic ingredients for a fresh taste. The recipe serves two as a main meal or four as a side dish.
Kitchen Sink Veggie Salad
Place a generous amount of salad greens in a large bowl. Add chopped and seeded vine-ripened tomato, coarsely chopped avocado, sliced sweet onion rings, paper-thin sliced peeled cucumber, shredded carrots, oil cured dry black olives, thinly sliced jalapeno peppers, thinly sliced garlic, slivered dates and snipped dulse. Dulse is a seaweed that you can find in the Asian food section of gourmet stores and markets. Toss the salad. For the dressing, thin a 1/4 cup of sesame tahini with the juice of half an orange and a few splashes each of apple cider vinegar and olive oil. Add a bit of soy sauce to taste. This salad is very flavorful and needs very little dressing, so use it sparingly. Sprinkle nutritional yeast flakes over the top. Nutritional yeast is a popular vegan food that looks and tastes somewhat like Parmesan cheese. You can find it in the bulk food section of your supermarket or health food store. Sesame tahini is available in Indian and Middle Eastern markets, as well as many health food stores. If you cannot find tahini or prefer a lighter dressing, toss the salad with a little olive oil, soy sauce or Bragg's liquid aminos, and a bit of orange or lemon juice.
Spanish Rice Salad
Chop a head of cauliflower in your food processor until it resembles rice. Remove to a large bowl. In the processor, roughly chop half a sweet onion, a red bell pepper, one jalapeno, a handful of cilantro and 1 tsp. each of sea salt, chili powder and paprika; pulse to dice. Add to the bowl. Mash together two ripe avocados, the juice of half a lemon and a 1/4 cup of olive oil. Toss with the ingredients in the bowl. Serve over a bed of organic salad greens. Add additional chopped avocado and two chopped tomatoes to the top. The recipe serves two hungry vegans or four as sides.
Vegan Taco Salad
Soak 1 1/2 cup of raw walnuts in water for about six hours or overnight. Combine the walnuts along with 1 1/2 tsp. of cumin, 1 tsp. of chili powder, 1 tsp. of coriander, 2 tsp. of soy sauce, a generous squirt of lime juice, a large spoonful of hot Asian chili paste and a handful of cilantro. Pulse until the mixture resembles ground taco meat. Place , chopped tomato and diced onion on four plates. Top with shredded vegan cheese and a generous dollop of "taco meat." Add vegan sour cream and salsa, if desired.
Tags: salad greens, chili powder, chopped avocado, food section, handful cilantro