How To Build The Ultimate Plant-Based Salad Bowl

Eating salad is a great way to pack lots of vitamins, minerals, antioxidants, phytonutrients, enzymes, and fiber into your diet. But salad can be a very broad term.

Salads aren't always healthy — especially if you add processed dressing or drown your veggies in excess oil.

Salads can also have too few calories and leave you hungry. I remember days when I’d decide to "eat healthy" and just have salad for lunch — my salad would consist of romaine lettuce, cucumbers, tomatoes, and lemon juice.

Sometimes I felt like I was hungrier than before I had eaten, which would lead to bingeing on cookies later.

Here’s my favorite seven-step formula for creating salad bowls that are flavorful, nourishing, and satisfying.

There’s no right or wrong way to make a salad. If you have any tips and tricks for creating your own salad bowls, please make sure to let the community know in the comments below.

1. Bed of leafy greens

Include as much of the greens as you think can fit in your stomach. It’s pretty much impossible to overeat leafy greens!

2. Raw vegetables

3. Lightly cooked vegetables

You can skip this step if you want to make a raw salad. I sometimes like to add some cooked veggies, especially in the colder months of the year.

4. Legumes

Adding beans or lentils to a salad bowl makes your dish more filling and nourishing, as legumes are rich in protein, iron, and fiber.

Tip: Soak beans overnight before cooking. This reduces the amount of enzyme inhibitors in beans, which makes them more digestible and makes it easier for you to absorb their nutrients.

You can also whip up a hummus — try this oil-free creamy hummus recipe.

5. Seeds or nuts

6. Dressing

If you add a lot of different ingredients and hummus to your salad bowl, you can simply use some lemon or lime juice as your dressing.

Avoid store-bought dressings, as they usually contain preservatives and other not-so-healthy ingredients.

7. Herbs and spices