Vegan Summer Cobb Salad with Crispy Tofu
This famous classic as a vegan version. The salad is full of flavour, delicious crispy tofu and a tangy red wine and dijon vinaigrette.
What is a Cobb salad?
Most of us know the Cobb salad as an instant classic. Made of lettuce, hard-boiled eggs, chicken, bacon, avocado, cheese, and tomatoes and topped with red wine vinaigrette. It's a popular restaurant menu item and is even considered a little bit decadent as far as salads go.
Vegan cobb salad?
A vegan Cobb salad? Is there such a thing? Of course there is! And, admittedly, I'm stretching the name a wee bit, but as the traditional Cobb salad, an American main dish, garden salad is made of chopped lettuce.
As we know it, the Cobb salad is a main-dish American garden salad typically made with chopped salad greens, so there's actually no reason why we couldn't play around with the ingredients and create a healthy vegan version.
What can I use in a Cobb salad?
We already know what is in a traditional Cobb salad. For the vegan version feel free to take some creative liberty to make your own version. When creating a salad it's good to start with a base of crispy salad leaves. Then add some crunchy vegetables like peppers, cucumbers, and tomatoes to bulk up the salad.
Time to add some protein! I love crispy tofu, it's so versatile and can easily replace the chicken in the traditional Cobb salad. It's both delicious and adds an extra crunch.
Now that we have the basics, we want to add fun to the salad. For this recipe, I added some quick pickled onions and pecan nuts. Then I topped the salad with a tangy red wine and dijon vinaigrette.
This Vegan summer Cobb salad is:
- Fresh
- Healthy
- Vegan
- Vegetarian
- Dairy-free
- Egg-free
- Meat-free
- Delicious
- Tangy
- Crunchy
What you'll need to make this Vegan Summer Cobb Salad:
- Crispy salad leaves
- Baby plum tomatoes
- Cucumber
- Crispy tofu
- Pecan nuts
- Pickled red onions
- Red wine and dijon vinaigrette
This famous classic as a vegan version. The salad is full of flavour, delicious crispy tofu and a tangy red wine and dijon vinaigrette.
- 170 g crispy salad leaves
- 250 g baby plum tomatoes, cut in half
- 1/2 cucumber, cut in slices
- 280 g tofu
- 1/2 cup pecan nuts
- 4 portions quick pickled red onions
- 8 tbsp red wine and djon vinaigrette
Start by preparing the quick pickled onions. First, slice the onion as thinly as you can. Place the sliced onion in a glass jar. Pour 1 cup of water and ½ cup of apple cider vinegar into the jar and add 1 ½ tsp of salt and 1 tbsp of coconut sugar. Close the jar and shake it well. Let sit at room temperature for 1 hour.
To make the vinaigrette, pour ½ cup of olive oil into a jar, add 2 tbsp of red wine vinegar and 1 tbsp of Dijon mustard. Then add ½ tsp of Italian garlic seasoning, ¼ tsp of salt and ¼ tsp of pepper. Close the jar tightly and shake well to blend all the ingredients.
To make the tofu, start by rinsing and drying the tofu. Then cut the tofu into small cubes and add them to a bowl. Add ½ tsp vegan bouillon powder, ½ tsp nutritional yeast, ½ tsp pepper and garlic steak seasoning, ¼ tsp salt and ¼ tsp black pepper. Mix well to coat all the tofu cubes with the spices. Add 2 tbsp of cornstarch and mix again to coat the tofu. Shallow fry the tofu cubes in 2 tbsp of vegetable oil for 15 minutes, turning the tofu cubes gently to get them all evenly golden and crispy.
Add the crispy salad leaves to a bowl, top with the tomatoes, cucumber and pecan nuts. Top with the quick pickled onion and drizzle some red wine and dijon vinaigrette over the salad before serving.
- Amount Per Serving
- Calories 420kcal