Recipe for Healthy Farro Salad with Fruit & Fresh Herbs

A vegan farro recipe for every season

This farro salad recipe is a grain salad you can work into your recipe rotation any time of the year. Although it’s an exceptionally healthy recipe, what’s really remarkable about this farro recipe the robust flavor–not to mention a variety of textures to tempt even more senses.

Cooking with farro

The recipe, our latest from Diane Brown, author of The Seduction Cookbook, calls for pre-cooking the farro. She likes to use a quick cooking variety. (Her favorite is the one sold at Trader Joe’s stores.) Just keep in mind that farro sold as quick-cooking has some or all of the bran removed, which means its less nutritious than whole grain farro.

Whatever type of farro you choose to buy, you can cook it just like pasta, added to boiling water. Just check the recommended cooking time on the package for a ballpark idea of when it will be done. But don’t go just by the instructions, use instinct and tasting to ensure that your farro is properly cooked. It should be al dente, with a slight firmness in the middle but mostly soft.

Hungry for more farro recipes? Check out Diane’s Hearty Farro with Mushrooms & Spinach.

Although Diane doesn’t mention it in the instructions for her farro salad, we like to toast our farro before adding it to the boiling water. You can toast the farro in a dry sauté pan until it starts to turn golden and fragrant, no more than 10 minutes.

How to customize this farro salad recipe for each season

As you can see from Diane’s recipe below, she leaves a lot of room for customizing the recipe, either by season or by what’s on hand. You’ll notice she leaves the choice of both the herbs and the dried fruit up to you.

We wanted to make it a complete meal by adding our greens, so we added an entire cup of chopped baby arugula along with a few minced basil leaves and the dried fruit. Since mint and parsley tend to be readily available year-round, these might be your choice in fall or winter. And if you’re looking to do a farro salad at the Holidays, the crimson of cranberries combine with the vibrant green of winter makes a nice, seasonal touch.

This Healthy Farro Salad recipe is intended to serve four as a hearty side dish. But it could also be used as a meatless (vegan) main course for two, perhaps for a low-key date night at home. (After all, the dried fruits and herbs like basil are all aphrodisiacs. And many of the nutrients found in farro will support healthy sexual hormones.)

Although you can serve this recipe warm or cold, we recommend serving the Farro Salad warm for dinner. Then you can put the leftovers in your lunch box to enjoy as cold salad the next day.

Want more great salad recipes? Don’t miss our salad recipe section! 

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Farro Salad with Fruit and Fresh Herbs

Prep Time

10 mins

Cook Time

20 mins

Total Time

30 mins

 

This quick and easy grain-based salad is a healthy, year-round dinner solution. Serve it as a hearty side dish for 4 or as a vegetarian (vegan) main course for two.

Course: Main Course, Vegetarian Main Course

Cuisine: American

Dish Type: Grain Salad, Salad

Cooking Style: vegan, Vegetarian

Diet and Health: Healthy

Ingredient: farro

Servings: 4 servings

Created by: Diane Brown

Ingredients

• 2 cups cooked farro
• 10 carrots peeled and sliced in 2” sections
• 1 Tbsp olive oil
• salt & pepper
• 1-2 Tbsp or to taste your favorite dried fruit, finely chopped (apricots, peaches, cherries, cranberries, raisins or currants)
• 1-2 Tbsp fresh herbs finely chopped (parsley, dill, basil, mint, chives, etc or substitute with arugula or spinach)
• zest of one lemon
• juice of 1/2 lemon
• 1 Tbsp pine nuts substitute chopped pecans or pistachios
• additional olive oil to taste
• additional salt & pepper to taste

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.

2. Place your carrots on a baking sheet in a single layer, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt & pepper.

3. Turn them periodically with a spatula as they cook and take them out when they are charred but still a little crisp. (This should take 15-20 minutes.)

4. Add whatever chopped up dried fruit you have, I used apricots and cherries, but figs, raisins, pears, all would be great!
5. Fold in a handful of chopped herbs, like dill, basil, mint, even arugula or spinach works.
6. Then fold in the lemon zest and lemon juice.
7. After all the other ingredients are added, gently toss in the nuts, drizzle with olive oil and season with salt and pepper to taste
8. Adjust your seasoning with additional lemon juice and olive oil if needed.

Notes

It will be wonderful for 3 days, so prep it in advance or enjoy it right away.

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