Kitchen Sink Sunflower Salad

by Lindsay March 29, 2018

A header for a web page that reads "reader recipe of the month".

Once a month, we ask readers to submit their best recipes, and we pick one, and we make it, and we eat it!

This month our theme was salads, and HOLY HEAVEN we got a lot of yummy salad submissions. I have never felt so much love towards vegetables in all my life. But not just vegetables – noodles, quinoa, chicken, fruit – every type of salad was well-represented.

We sorted them, and drooled over them, and eventually settled on the one that intrigued us all: The Kitchen Sink Sunflower Salad, submitted by Misha.

Monthly reader Misha wearing beanie and warm clothes smiling in the snow.

Here’s what this salad is all about:

vegetables
more vegetables
any vegetables you want, really
they could be roasted vegetables – like sweet potato and brussels sprouts
or raw vegetables – like a randomly crunchy cucumber
could also include beans and other protein-y things
and you should throw a handful of seeds on there
but mostly
THE DRESSING
a creamy, clean-eating, sunflowery dressing with a pinch of curry powder to give it life.

This is very much a make-it-with-whatever-you-have-salad which happens to be my favorite kind of salad.

How To Make Our Sunflower Salad (40 Secs):

Hands serving Sunflower Salad into individual bowls.

Misha, thank you so much for your Kitchen Sink Sunflower Salad recipe submission! As you can see from the pictures, we loved it. We loved it so much that while we were eating, I forgot to take any more pictures.

There was silent crunching. There was joy. There was plate-licking.

And there were plans made to make it again.

You guys need to try this!

Misha knows what’s up.

Kitchen Sink Sunflower Salad

4.9 from 18 reviews

Author: Lindsay
Total Time: 45 minutes
Yield: 4 servings

Print Recipe

Description

Kitchen Sink Sunflower Salad – featuring a veggie rainbow of brussels sprouts, sweet potato, beans, cucumber, and kale, and then drenched in this creamy, clean-eating sunflower dressing! YUM.

Ingredients

For the Sunflower Dressing

2 tablespoons sunflower seed butter
4 tablespoons plain yogurt
pinch of garlic powder
1–2 teaspoons of curry powder
1–2 teaspoons cumin
freshly ground pepper
salt
water to thin it out to taste

For the Salad (this part is open for interpretation based on what you have!):

1 sweet potato
10 brussel sprouts
2 cups kale
1 cucumber
1 cup black beans (or any beans)
protein of choice (we used two crumbled veggie burgers )
1/2 cup sunflower seeds

Instructions

Whisk the dressing up in a small bowl, or run it through the food processor until smooth.
Chop everything up.
Season the sweet potatoes and brussels sprouts. Drizzle with a tiny bit of oil and roast at 425 degrees until nice and brown.
Toss it all together! YESSSSS PLEASE!

Notes

Misha says: “I’m very particular with my sunflower butter, as I find not all are equal. Here I really do recommend the Trader Joe’s sunflower butter with the yellow and blue container design. DO NOT use the green/yellow sunflower seed butter from Trader Joe’s. It tastes completely different, and not at all good good in my opinion.”

Misha also says: “For the yogurt, you can use Greek or not; Trader Joe’s French village whole milk yogurt is highly recommended.”