40 Harvest Salad Recipes to Try This Fall

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When fall comes around, it’s time to switch out bike shorts with trousers, daisies with candles and summer dishes with harvest salads. Adding a harvest salad to your nightly menu ensures you reap a ton of health benefits with a delicious medley of ingredients. Full of fall-forward foods like crunchy kale, crispy apples, velvety squash and sweet dried cranberries, harvest salads are perfect to cozy up with this season. Serve them as a hearty side dish or filling main meal that is sure to please. Check out these divine harvest salad recipes to try this fall.

What is a Harvest Salad?

A harvest salad is loaded with fall’s favourite flavours, like roasted butternut squash, apple, kale, dried figs, pomegranates, pecans and goat cheese. Finished with dressings containing ingredients like honey dijon, maple syrup, tahini and balsamic vinegar, harvest salads are hearty, comforting and perfectly filling for lunch or dinner. While spring and summer salads are bright and fresh, fall harvest salads are earthy, crisp and indulgent. They can be paired alongside your favourite seasonal mains, or can stand on their own with a hefty dose of protein.

5 Tips to Make a Harvest Salad Healthier

1. Swap Lettuce with Kale

While regular lettuce is typical for spring and summer salads, swap to kale come fall. It pairs well with seasonal fruits and veggies like sweet potato, apples and figs, plus it’s loaded with nutrients. Kale is rich in vitamins A, C and K and is rich in antioxidants. It’s also a good source of calcium, magnesium and potassium, minerals that most people don’t get enough of.

2. Add Protein

Harvest salads, with their nutritious ingredients and hearty dressings are already quite healthy, but adding a source of protein is always a good idea. From chicken breast, to turkey, salmon, beans or chickpeas, protein helps boost your metabolism, fuels your energy and increases your feelings of fullness. Add it to your salad to keep you satisfied!

3. Create a Grain Base

Grains work super well in harvest salads since they’re nice and hearty. Adding whole grains to your salad is a satisfying way to feel full for longer, as they’re naturally high in fibre. Quinoa, barley and wild rice are whole grains that would make an excellent addition to your harvest salads.

4. Sprinkle on Nuts and/or Seeds

Nuts like almonds, pistachios, pecans and walnuts are the perfect addition to your harvest salad and they’re ripe with health benefits. They’re an excellent source of healthy fat, rich in antioxidants and high in fibre. Have a nut allergy? Swap nuts with seeds like pumpkin or sunflower seeds. Sprinkle them on to your salad at the end for a well-rounded and tasty meal.

5. Use Healthier Cheeses

Cheese and salad make so much sense together. Adding cheese can really balance the flavour of your salad and boost the protein and calcium content, but the wrong cheese can skyrocket calories and saturated fat. Luckily there are a number of healthier cheeses that work well in harvest salads. Mozzarella, goat cheese and blue cheese are all wonderful options. Avoid processed cheeses at all costs!