Roasted Chickpea Quinoa Bowls with Creamy Vegan Ranch

Vegan Recipes

Roasted Chickpea Quinoa Bowls with Creamy Vegan Ranch

Dave

2024-02-29

Roasted Chickpea Quinoa Bowls with Creamy Vegan Ranch

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These roasted chickpea quinoa bowls are a high-protein, flavor-packed possibility so as to add to your weekly meal prep or dinner rotation. They function fluffy, cooked quinoa, crispy baked tempeh bacon and roasted chickpeas, chopped romaine lettuce, and a beneficiant drizzle of creamy do-it-yourself vegan ranch dressing. Every bowl packs greater than twenty-five grams of plant protein, together with fiber, texture, taste, and shade—what may very well be higher?

A large, white bowl is filled with vegetables, roasted chickpeas, quinoa, and a creamy ranch dressing. The bowl is topped with pepitas.

The longer I domesticate a behavior of vegan meal prep, the extra I recognize the worth of vegan fundamentals.

By “fundamentals,” I imply simple parts that may multitask effectively in meals. Fundamentals may embody easy vegan proteins, do-it-yourself vegan cheeses, sauces, and snacks.

With the best fundamentals in your fridge, you may go on to create what I consider as being “meeting” meals. They’re not a lot recipes with a number of cooking steps a lot as the tip product of blending and matching.

More often than not, what I combine and match are mixtures of proteins, like beans, tofu, or tempeh, entire grains, sauces, and no matter greens I occur to have at dwelling.

These roasted chickpea quinoa bowls are an ideal instance of what’s doable if you take the time to organize just a few stable vegan fundamentals. Large taste, a number of texture, and an particularly nutritious meal.

Due to not one, however three sources of plant protein—chickpeas, quinoa, and tempeh—certainly one of these bowls provides about twenty-five grams of protein.

Greens, beans, and grains are all ample sources of dietary fiber, iron, and phytonutrients. Right here, they’re introduced in a enjoyable, flavorful, and colourful approach.

Protein-packed meal prep

I’m in all probability a damaged document with the next message, however I feel it’s so essential to place protein at entrance and heart on the subject of vegan meal prep.

My reasoning is that the opposite macronutrients—fats and carbohydrates—are inclined to maintain themselves.

In the event you eat a plant-based eating regimen, with its plentiful choices of legumes, grains, grain merchandise, corn, and potatoes, it’s actually not exhausting to acquire satisfactory carbohydrates in your eating regimen.

Remembering to incorporate a healthful fats supply with meals could require just a little extra thought, nevertheless it occurs very simply. A drizzle of French dressing or olive oil, a sprinkling of toasted nuts or seeds, an avocado half or scoop of guacamole—all of this stuff might be added to your meal immediately.

With protein, it’s just a little extra difficult.

After all it’s not a giant ask to open up a can of beans and add some to a salad or bowl.

Nevertheless, if you would like a extremely well-seasoned protein—for instance, flavorful brothy beans, baked and marinated balsamic tofu, or savory tempeh meatballs to your subsequent bowl of pasta—you’ll must do some planning.

For me, planning = meal prep.

I can have a number of nice concepts about upcoming meals that I’d prefer to eat. But when I don’t carve out time every week to plan and execute meal prep, only a few of them will come to fruition.

As I wrote in my cookbook The Vegan Week,

“My enthusiasm for cooking will in all probability all the time wax and wane, however due to the behavior of meal prep, I handle to cook dinner and eat nicely even after I’m resistant or unmotivated. I turn into extra intentional about what I eat, and my meals turn into extra healthful. My style buds are grateful for variety, and my physique is grateful for smart, balanced vitamin.”

A smart consumption of vegan protein is a giant a part of how I conceptualize “balanced vitamin.” Meal prep is how I make it occur.

Two small baking sheets are lined with parchment paper and strips of vegan tempeh

An aluminum baking sheet is covered in crispy roasted chickpeas, which have just been pulled from the oven.

For this roasted chickpea quinoa bowl, you’ll meal prep three separate, good sources of protein.

These are:

Collectively, these three components add as much as a number of protein, and a different array of amino acids, at that.

Past their performance, these parts make the bowl a delight to eat. The chickpeas and tempeh bacon every present crispy texture, whereas the quinoa is tender and fluffy.

By means of in a creamy dressing and bowl of crunchy greens, and also you’ve bought a bowl that’s particularly filled with sensory delight.

An angled image of a glass mason jar, resting on a white surface. It contains a creamy vegan ranch dressing with herbs. — You need to use both contemporary or dried herbs in your do-it-yourself vegan ranch, however I feel that contemporary herbs add essentially the most vibrant taste.

Creamy, do-it-yourself vegan ranch dressing

A phrase about that dressing: it’s a brand new invention for me, although I’ve been making an attempt to good a do-it-yourself ranch for years.

After experimenting with a number of components and creamy bases, I referred to as upon my culinary MVP, cashew nuts, to create a wealthy, easy texture.

I like to make use of contemporary herbs within the vegan ranch, moderately than dried, however my recipe affords choices for utilizing both.

For me, ranch dressing + smoky flavors appears like a pure, basic combo. Actually, it was this dressing that impressed your complete roasted chickpea quinoa bowl.

Nevertheless, dressings are one of many do-it-yourself fundamentals that I create most frequently, so I’ve options to give you if ranch isn’t your factor. Listed below are some:

The Vegan Week

Embrace the enjoyment of consuming do-it-yourself meals day-after-day with the hearty and healthful recipes in The Vegan Week.

Whether or not you will have three, two, and even only one hour of time to spare, The Vegan Week will present you learn how to batch cook dinner different, colourful, and comforting dishes over the weekend.

Learn how to make roasted chickpea quinoa bowls

My finest recommendation for making these flavorful, successful bowls is to try the varied parts, then take into consideration if you wish to meal prep them.

In the event you stagger the preparation course of, it’ll be really easy to simply put the bowls collectively if you’re able to eat (or to pack up a meal).

Once I put together a grain bowl like this one, I all the time maintain no less than one or two parts forward of time. Ideally, I put together all of them prematurely of assembling.

If you wish to take a extremely proactive strategy to the roasted chickpea quinoa bowls, you may freeze one or a few the parts. Roasted chickpeas, tempeh bacon, and cooked quinoa can all be frozen for as much as 6 weeks.

With that mentioned, right here’s a walkthrough.

Step 1: Put together your protein parts in keeping with your schedule

Get a head begin on this recipe by making ready no less than the crispy tempeh bacon and crispy roasted chickpeas. You can also make them collectively—as long as the oven goes to be on, chances are you’ll as nicely multitask—or create them individually.

For the tempeh bacon, keep in mind that it wants a while to marinate (two hours) earlier than you bake it.

An overhead image of two small, white bowls. One contains crispy roasted chickpeas, while the other contains darkened, crispy baked tempeh bacon. — The crispy parts of this recipe, chickpeas and tempeh bacon, might be roasted across the identical time or ready individually, advance or proper earlier than mixing the bowls. Modify this to suit your schedule!

Step 2: Put together the quinoa

Quinoa takes much less time to cook dinner than many different grains, which makes it handy. Nevertheless, it could actually typically be just a little finicky.

So as to keep away from quinoa that’s too gummy or not tender sufficient, I like to recommend a 1:1.75 ratio of grain to cooking liquid.

I additionally suggest simmering the quinoa, lined, for precisely 13 minutes. Then, take away it from warmth and let it stand, lined, for an additional 5 minutes.

An overhead image of a silver saucepan, which is filled with fluffy, cooked quinoa. — 13 minutes of stovetop simmering, a 5 minute resting interval off warmth, and a few fluffing with a fork will guarantee tender, completely cooked quinoa every time.

Lastly, uncover the quinoa and fluff it with a fork.

Sure, a exact cooking time of 13 minutes could sound just a little foolish. But I’ve discovered that the following pointers are the important thing to reaching completely cooked quinoa, meal after meal.

Step 3: Assemble your bowls

Lastly, it’s time to place your roasted chickpea quinoa bowls collectively.

Distribute the chopped romaine into 4 bowls. Divide the tempeh bacon, chickpeas, quinoa amongst them, then add just a little heap of halved grape or cherry tomatoes.

Lastly, go forward and gown every bowl generously—smother the bowl, if you wish to!—with the creamy vegan ranch.

A white bowl holds greens, tomatoes, cooked quinoa, chickpeas, and some slices of tempeh bacon. — Grape tomatoes add shade and juiciness to the chickpea quinoa ranch bowls.

I personally like to prime these bowls with pepitas, a kind of shelled pumpkin seeds. In the event you like just a little additional crunch, you can additionally attempt topping the bowls with:

Some contemporary, chopped cilantro or parsley is a pleasant final touch as nicely.

Meal prep & storage

In the event you don’t plan to serve the roasted chickpea quinoa bowls straight away, then you may retailer them in an hermetic container within the fridge for as much as 5 days.

There are two methods to go about this: you can assemble your “bowls” in meal prep storage containers (you may get my suggestions in my newbie’s information to vegan meal prep), or you may retailer the parts individually and assemble as prepared.

In both case, I like to recommend storing the dressing by itself and including it proper earlier than you sit all the way down to eat.

Variations

As with a lot of the vegan bowls on this web site, there’s loads of area to range parts and make substitutions inside the roasted chickpea quinoa bowls.

Most notably, you need to use store-bought roasted chickpeas or tempeh bacon rather than do-it-yourself. I like the Tofurky model Smoky Maple Bacon specifically.

You can additionally commerce roasted chickpeas for plain, un-roasted chickpeas, straight from a can. The bowl can have rather less crunch, nevertheless it’ll nonetheless be filled with texture total.

Tempeh bacon might be changed by any of the next easy plant proteins:

You can additionally add a store-bought, baked tofu. A couple of manufacturers provide ready-to-eat choices lately.

Lastly, whereas I like the crunch of chopped romaine within the bowls, there’s no purpose to not experiment with an alternate sort of lettuce or varied extra veggies.

Roasted purple peppers, broccoli florets, chopped cucumber, and shredded cabbage would all work properly within the recipe.

Lastly, it’s very rewarding to make do-it-yourself ranch, nevertheless it’s not at all a necessity. The Observe Your Coronary heart model and Primal Kitchen model every make good, store-bought vegan ranch dressings.

Extra nutritious vegan bowls to savor

In the event you love a great bowl for a meal prep dinner or meal prep lunch, I’ve loads of extra recipes so that you can discover.

Listed below are just a few of my favorites, all of which put protein entrance and heart:

And right here’s the crunchy, satisfying new creation that I’m including to the listing.