Vital Force Naturals

This salad is a great way to get your 5 a day intake of green veg! Roasting veg caramelizes and makes it lovely and sweet and easier to eat if you struggle with conventional cooking. When roasting the veg don’t overcrowd so they have room to caramelize and add or change the veg depending on your preference, see below. This is a hot salad that’s great on it’s own with some chunky bread or as a side

Serves 2 – 4
1 large broccoli cut into bite size pieces
340g Brussels sprouts halved or quartered
Handful pine nuts
2 tablespoons virgin olive oil
1/4 teaspoon Himalayan salt
1 cup ready cooked lentils
4 big handfuls rocket
Parmesan
Dressing
2 tablespoons virgin olive oil
1 tablespoon lemon juice
1 teaspoon honey
1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
Pinch salt
Pinch chilli flakes
Black pepper

Preheat the oven to 220°. Toss the broccoli and sprouts in the olive oil and salt and spread on a baking tray in a single layer. Bake for 25 ish minutes tossing halfway until crisp and tender and caramelized on the edges. Towards the end of cooking throw in the pine nuts, for about 5 minutes. Whisk together the dressing ingredients while the veg cools a little. In a large bowl combine the roasted veg, lentils and rocket and drizzle to taste with the dressing. Just before serving sprinkle with parmesan and black pepper to taste.

Alternative ingredients:
Broccoli and sprouts seem to go together well but I have also done this salad with cauliflower, mushrooms, beans, asparagus, cabbage etc, various combinations of each. Try whatever you have in your fridge or whatever’s in season I’ve added the pine nuts but you can leave out or try any other seeds – pumpkin, sunflower, sesame
Rocket – watercress, parsley, coriander, spinach

This works best as a hot salad served immediately but if there’s leftovers store the dressing separately and mix in when you’re ready to serve. When chopping broccoli trim the stalk, chop and throw in the pot. This bit often gets thrown away but it actually contains a lot of nutrients

Taken from cookieandkate.com