Green Spelt Salad w/ Roasted Pumpkin

Green Spelt Salad with arugula, roasted pumpkin, beluga lentils, and pomegranate.

This Green Spelt Salad is full of amazing textures and flavors, because it’s made with so many seasonal deliciousness. It’s hearty, savory, and comforting, with a hint of sweetness, spiciness, and a lots of flavor. This healthy salad is easy to make, and can be make ahead, so it’s great as an office lunch or a quick weeknight meal.

Spicy, maple roasted pumpkin cubes, cooked green spelt, pomegranate seeds, beluga lentils, sunflower seeds, red onion, vegan feta, and a tahini-mustard dressing. What a heavenly combination, right?

If you are into fall flavors, you’ll absolutely love this salad!

Green Spelt Salad is…

• Vegan and vegetarian
• Healthy
• Rich in vitamins and nutrients
• Filling
• Seasonal with fall produce
• Great as a main or side dish
• Perfect to make ahead
• Delicious served cold or warm
• Customizable
• Full of flavor and texture
• Savory
• Slightly spicy

What is Green Spelt?

Green spelt or Grünkern is spelt, that was harvested before it was fully ripened, and then was artificially dried. It has a nutty, aromatic taste, and a pleasantly chewy texture, and it is a great source of protein and fibre.

Green spelt can be used whole, or ground into flour, grits, or flakes. Although you can’t bake bread with it, it’s great for salads, stews, soups, or even sweet cakes. It is also popular in Germany to use green spelt in burger patties.

You can buy green spelt in larger supermarkets, or health and organic shops. If you can’t find any, you can also use freekeh, spelt, wheat berries, or farro here instead.

How to make Green Spelt Salad

Making this Green Spelt Salad is pretty simple, and many steps can be made at the same time or even ahead. You can cook green spelt and beluga lentils, roast the pumpkin cubes, and prepare the dressing a few days earlier, then simply keep in the fridge separately in air-tight containers.

1. You start by cooking green spelt in double amount of water. It takes about 40-45 minutes to reach a soft, but still chewy texture.
2. In a separate pot you cook beluga lentils with double amount of water as well. Beluga lentils need about 20 minutes to be cooked perfectly.
3. While green spelt and lentils are cooking, you can spice your pumpkin cubes, then roast them in the oven until golden and crispy.
4. Also, you can prepare the dressing now. Simply whisk together oil, tahini, lime juice, mustard, and minced garlic. Season with salt and pepper, and adjust consistency with a little water, if needed.
5. When ready to serve, add cooked green spelt, beluga lentils, roasted pumpkin, arugula, red onion, pomegranate seeds, sunflower seeds, and vegan feta cheese to a large salad bowl. Drizzle with dressing, and toss to mix everything.

That’s all. Easy, isn’t it?

How to serve Green Spelt Salad?

You can serve Green Spelt Salad both as a main and as a side dish.

With a slice of toast bread this salad is lovely as a healthy weeknight dinner, as a quick office lunch, or even as a picnic salad.

Or serve the salad as a side dish with falafel, tofu or seitan roast, grilled veggies, potato cakes, or any of your favorite vegan meat.

CUSTOMIZE IT THE WAY YOU LIKE IT!

You can play around with the ratios here, or simply swap whatever ingredients you feel like.

• Green Spelt: Freekeh is a great alternative here, but you can use any other grain as well. Spelt, wheat berries, farro, quinoa, millet, or rice are all good options.

• Beluga lentils: Choose brown or green lentils instead. Chickpeas, edamame, lima beans, or kidney beans are delicious as well.

• Pumpkin: Choose your favorite type of pumpkin or winter squash. I like red kuri squash, but butternut, acorn, kabocha, or delicata squash are great as well. Or try sweet potato, or golden beets.

• Arugula: Baby spinach, lamb’s lettuce, kale, savoy cabbage or some mixed greens can be used here too.

• Pomegranate: For a little sweetness you can add grapes, apple, pear or plum to this salad as well.

• Sunflower seeds: Use pine nuts, chopped almonds, walnuts or hazelnuts, pumpkin seeds or poppy seeds.

• Vegan feta: I like both homemade or store-bought versions here. You can choose any other vegan cheese as well, or just simply omit it altogether.

• Dressing: Play around with the ratio of ingredients if you like. Or just go with something super simple, like an olive oil and lemon juice combo. Other delicious dressing options can be Sweet Mustard Dressing, Almond Maple Dressing, Spicy Peanut Dressing, or Creamy Tahini Dressing.

More delicious salad recipes to try:

• Kohlrabi Slaw with Apple and Hazelnut
• Winter Buddha Bowl
• Roasted Carrot Salad with Tahini Yogurt
• Hummus Potato Salad
• Orzo Salad with Roasted Broccoli
• Buckwheat Salad with Roasted Sweet Potato
• Spiced Cauliflower and Quinoa Salad

More pumpkin recipes to try:

• Kale and Farro Stuffed Mini Pumpkins
• Gnocchi with Pumpkin Cheese Sauce
• Pumpkin & Walnut Stuffed Christmas Wreath
• Savory Pumpkin Rolls
• Beluga Lentil and Pumpkin Salad
• Pumpkin Hummus
• Quinoa, Pumpkin and Kale Salad w/ Tempeh

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