Every day, my husband asks, "What's for lunch?" as he runs out the door for work. The question is usually because I'm not good at remembering to pack his lunch. But luckily, grain bowls or salads are an easy answer! When I do plan for lunch, I make this grape salad. In fact, I prefer putting it together the night before and letting the flavors develop overnight. It's easy to make and easy to pack!
This salad is a variation on my favorite chicken salad recipe. It combines tangy grapes with creamy, flavorful blue cheese. While it may not be for everyone, I strongly recommend you give this grape salad a try. Especially if you love blue cheese!
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This wonderful fall grain salad gets texture from chewy spelt berries, sweetness from grapes, and a boost of protein from the chickpeas.
Tips & Tricks: Soft cheeses crumble more easily when they are cold. Leave the blue cheese in the fridge. Then, add it to the salad when you're ready.
Stock up: get the pantry ingredients you will need: spelt, chickpeas, sunflower seeds
Nutrition: See the information.
This recipe is one that I don't usually change. Most of the time, I make this grape salad as written. However, there are a few ways you can change it up that include the following.
Greens: This grape salad can be made as a more traditional green salad. Add about 4 cups of greens such as spinach or baby kale.
Grains: Swap the spelt for any other leftover grain such as farro or barley.
Vegan: This salad can easily be made vegan without the blue cheese. Use avocado instead to keep the same texture.
Chickpeas are one of my main sources of protein. This is because I don't usually cook a lot with tofu or other meat substitutes. I like chickpeas since they are used in a wide array of meals. (They're also great to make a hummus snack!) So, if you have a can of chickpeas, try a few of my favorite chickpea meals:
Cauliflower and Chickpea Curry
Chickpea and Spinach Vegetable Burgers
Broccoli Chickpea Bowls with Homemade Teriyaki Sauce
This salad sounds quite interesting. Neither my husband nor I are big fans of blue cheese, but I'm thinking that subbing feta would work pretty well. This recipe also helps me to see why people cook big batches of grains and/or beans and keep them for spontaneous meal prep. That would greatly lessen the work of making a salad like this. And any time savers/stress reducers are very welcome in my kitchen right now.
Tried this for lunch today, and we really enjoyed it. The servings were very generous. My husband took one bite and said, "This is rather yummy" - which is a very high compliment. He didn't even realize this was a vegetarian dish until I told him. I substituted feta for the blue cheese and used kamut, because that's what I had. This recipe is definitely a keeper, and I will try it with blue cheese next time.
Do you mix the spelt in warm or cold?
I usually do cold so it doesn't melt the cheese.