I hope everyone is having a wonderful long weekend! This weekend I made a big French Lentil Salad, which I kind of threw together. It turned out to be delicious and you could add anything you happen to have in the fridge. So, if you’re all barbecued out this weekend and feeling a little sluggish from heavy food, this is a yummy, veggie-licious way to get back to eating healthy.

French Lentil Salad

(6-8 servings)

Ingredients:

• 1 pound French Lentils (they stay firmer than other types of lentil and they’re faster cooking, too)
• 16 oz vegetable or chicken stock (I used low-sodium chicken stock)
• Water
• 6 oz Goat cheese, crumbled
• Half a yellow onion, sliced
• 2 cloves garlic, diced fine
• 1 pint cherry tomatoes, halved
• 1 yellow and 1 orange pepper, diced fine
• 1/8 cup red wine vinegar
• 2 tablespoons extra virgin olive oil
• 1 teaspoon dried Italian seasoning
• salt & pepper to taste
• Pre washed mixed salad for the base of the French lentil salad

Okay, the last ingredient, the salad mix? That was kind of a mistake, but it worked out really well. I actually thought I was buying baby spinach leaves, which I was going to saute with the onion and garlic and mix through, but I accidentally bought a baby spinach blend salad.  Oops. Anyway, having salad leaves as a base made it look pretty and was delicious as well.

 

Directions:

Put water and stock on a high heat and add French lentils. By the way, this was totally another tip I picked up from Rocco DiSpirito’s talk at FitBlogNYC – he suggested any recipe that calls for boiling or reducing in water, you can substitute stock for more flavor. Once the liquid and lentils come to a boil, reduce heat and simmer uncovered, stirring occasionally, for about 35 minutes. While the lentils are cooking you can do all your chopping and prep work.

In a small pan, sauté onions and garlic on a very low heat in 1 tablespoon of olive oil. In a large bowl, combine your chopped peppers, tomatoes, cooked garlic and onion. Once the lentils are done, drain and add to the veggies. Toss with salt & pepper, dried Italian seasoning, red wine vinegar and remaining tablespoon of extra virgin olive oil. You can either add the crumbled goat cheese while the lentils are still warm, if you want it to get kind of melty (this is what I did) or, you could wait until the salad is chilled and add it then if you want it to stay crumbly.

Refrigerate until chilled for serving. The longer it stays in the fridge, the longer the flavors have to develop and combine. This also means that the second or third time you eat this as leftovers it will be even more delicious. Arrange salad leaves on a plate and spoon lentil salad on top to serve.

ENJOY!! 🙂