Broccoli, Brussels & Farro Salad

Adapted from Ruffage

To me, all salads should have good veggies, a crunchy element, some type of cheese, and light but flavorful dressing. I also enjoy grains in my salad because they help fill it out and make it heartier. This salad has one of my favorite grains, farro, which I highly recommend if you have not tried it before. It uses fried crumbled tempeh as the crunch, so if you don’t love tempeh, try it anyways because I think you might be surprised. If you really really don’t love tempeh though, I think toasted chopped walnuts would be a good sub. Feeds 2 as a main.

Farro

• 1 cup of farro

1. Rinse the farro well in a mesh colander or something that won’t let the grains escape.

2. Cook according to directions. I make my farro in an instant pot, but I have long since strayed from what my instant pot cookbook says for directions. I cook the farro with 1.5 cups of water on high pressure for 20 minutes and allow it to natural release for about 10 minutes after. The farro will need to be drained if you follow this approach.

3. Set aside to cool a little bit.

Broccoli & Brussels

• 1 lb-ish of broccoli crowns

• 1/2 lb of Brussels sprouts

• Olive oil

• Salt & pepper

1. Preheat the oven to 425F.

2. Cut the broccoli into in bite-sized floret pieces, where slightly larger is probably preferable to slightly smaller.

3. Toss with olive oil, salt and pepper.

4. Trim the ends of the Brussels sprouts and remove any tough outer leaves.

5. Quarter the Brussels sprouts and toss with olive oil, salt, and pepper.

6. Spread the veggies onto separate (preferably foil-lined) baking sheets.

7. Bake for around 15-20 minutes, depending on how fast things are crisping. My broccoli was on top and went for about 15 minutes, and I left the Brussels for about 2 minutes after that.

Tempeh

• Half a block of tempeh

• Your choice of neutral oil (I like sunflower)

1. Heat a very thin layer of oil over slightly-higher than medium heat, but below medium-high heat. For me, this is a 6 out of 10 on my stovetop dial.

2. Chop the tempeh into small pieces. I usually do this by chopping into thin slices and then chopping the slices into small pieces, similar to how I would dice an onion.

3. Fry the tempeh in the heated oil for about 10 minutes, maybe longer if you want it really crispy and maybe shorter if any small pieces look in danger of burning. Stir every few minutes or so to move the tempeh around and get all of the sides.

4. Set aside to cool and crisp further. If you feel like there’s a lot of oil, you can remove it from the pan onto a paper-towel lined plate to dry.

Assembly

• 3 oz of blue cheese (2 oz would also be fine)

• 1/4 - 1/3 cup of craisins

• 2 tbsp balsamic vinegar

• 1 tbsp apple cider vinegar

• 1/4 cup olive oil

1. Toss the farro with the vinegars and olive oil.

2. Add the roasted veggies, tempeh, and craisins and toss everything again.

3. Crumble the blue cheese into the salad and give it one final toss, taste-testing to see if any extra salt or pepper is needed. I added some extra pepper to mine. If you are like me and don’t actually let things cool because you’re hungry, your blue cheese will probably melt but I didn’t find that to be an issue.

4. Serve and enjoy!

If you made this with any swaps, let me know! Always happy to hear about modifications and maybe get some new ideas.