I am so obsessed with this delicious Fall kale salad topped with Roasted Butternut Squash, Quinoa, pecans, cranberries and Paneer (Indian cottage cheese) and tossed in a Flavorful Balsamic Vinaigrette.
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Roasted Butternut Squash Salad is healthy and this may be one of my favorite salads to date!
With Thanksgiving right around the corner, I figured it was a perfect time for this festive side dish recipe.
This fall kale salad is loaded with all the most delicious and colorful toppings to make for a great addition to your holiday table.
If you think salads are boring, I suggest trying this Roasted Butternut Squash Quinoa Salad recipe. You will love it.
Why I love this salad so much?
- This recipe is easy – ✔
- Perfect make-ahead recipe for big crowd or party – ✔
- Addictive – ✔
- Customizable to our liking – ✔
- Healthy – ✔
- Crave-worthy – ✔
- Loaded with superfoods – ✔
- Filling – ✔
- Kids Friendly – ✔
- Perfect for Office lunch – ✔
This is one of those salad recipes that checks all the good boxes for my family. 🙂
Roasted Butternut Quinoa Salad recipe is a perfect combination of flavors and textures that is truly magical.
How to make Roasted Butternut Quinoa Salad?
This recipe is divided into 4 easy steps.
Step 1 – Roast butternut Squash
Using a vegetable peeler, peel your butternut squash.
Take a sharp knife and cut the butternut squash in half. Remove all of the seeds from the inside. Peel the skin and cut it into bite-sized cubes.
Now take a cookie pan sheet and place the butternut squash pieces.
Oil them up with some extra virgin olive oil and season it with salt. Mix well.
Now roast them in a preheated oven @425 degree F. for about 20 to 25 minutes.
I like to toss the butternut squash cubes halfway through the bake time so that everything bakes evenly and the edges of your roasted butternut squash are golden brown and a bit crispy.
Once cooked, remove from the oven and set aside.
Step – 2 Cooking quinoa and prepare other components.
Cooking quinoa –
While Butternut is in the oven, let’s prepare quinoa. I prefer to cook quinoa in my instant pot.
Take ½ quinoa, wash them, add them into IP inner pot, add 1 cup of water and salt. Lock the lid and set the steam valve to its sealing position.
Select the Manual button and cook for 1 minute on high pressure. Allow the pressure release naturally. Once all the pressure released naturally, open the lid, fluff the quinoa with a fork and let it cools down.
Let’s prepare other things –
Chop kale and onions and keep them aside.
We will also use pecans and cranberries in this salad. you may substitute it with walnut or any nuts of your choice. Or if you want to make this salad nut-free, skip them.
I love to use Paneer in this recipe. You may use Feta cheese or goat cheese too.
If you would like to keep this meal vegan, sub out paneer for vegan cheese or you can completely skip the cheese part. Easy peasy.
Step – 3 Dressing
Moving on to the best part of this whole salad…the dressing! because what is a salad without the dressing?
So for this Roasted Butternut Squash Quinoa Salad, I have used my Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing. It is simple, delicious and very flavorful. You can also try this Pumpkin Vinaigrette Dressing.
Step – 4 Mixing all the ingredients
Add Chopped kale, onion, butternut squash, quinoa, pecans, cranberries and paneer to a large mixing bowl. Mix them well.
Now top with balsamic vinaigrette dressing and toss.
Enjoy Roasted Butternut squash quinoa salad!
If you are salad lover like me, Consider trying these popular salad recipes –
Quinoa Black bead Salad
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Roasted Butternut squash Quinoa Salad
Ingredients
- 3 cups – Butternut squash cubes
- 2.5 cups – Kale Chopped (Refer notes)
- ¼ cup – Onion chopped
- ½ cup – quinoa
- ¼ cup – Pecans Refer notes
- ¼ cup – cranberries Refer Notes
- 1 teaspoon – Olive oil
- ¼ teaspoon – salt
- ¼ cup – Paneer or any cheese Refer notes
- ⅓ cup – Balsamic Vinaigrette Refer Notes
Method
- Using a vegetable peeler, peel your butternut squash.
- Take a sharp knife and cut the butternut squash in half. Remove all of the seeds from the inside. Peel the skin and cut it into bite-sized cubes.
- Now take a cookie pan sheet and place the butternut squash pieces.
- Oil them up with some extra virgin olive oil and season it with salt. Mix well.
- Now roast them in a preheated oven @425 degree F. for about 20 to 25 minutes.
- I like to toss the butternut squash cubes halfway through the bake time so that everything bakes evenly and the edges of your roasted butternut squash are golden brown and a bit crispy.
- Once cooked, remove from the oven and set aside.
- Cooking quinoa –
- While Butternut is in the oven, lets prepare quinoa. I prefer to cook quinoa in my instant pot.
- Take ½ quinoa, wash them, add them into IP inner pot, add 1 cup of water and salt. Lock the lid and set the steam valve to its sealing position.
- Select the Manual button and cook for 1 minute on high pressure. Allow the pressure release naturally. Once all the pressure released naturally, open the lid, fluff the quinoa with a fork and let it cools down.
- Let’s prepare other things –
- Chop kale and onions and keep them aside.
- We will also use pecans and cranberries in this salad. you may substitute it with walnut or any nuts of your choice. Or if you want to make this salad nut-free, skip them.
- I love to use Paneer in this recipe. You may use Feta cheese or goat cheese too.
- If you would like to keep this meal vegan, sub out paneer for vegan cheese or you can completely skip the cheese part. Easy peasy.
- Moving on to the best part of this whole salad…the dressing! because what is a salad without the dressing?
- So for this Roasted Butternut Squash Quinoa Salad, I have used my Balsamic Vinaigrette Dressing. It is simple, delicious and very flavorful. You can also try this Pumpkin Vinaigrette Dressing.
- Add Chopped kale, onion, butternut squash, quinoa, pecans, cranberries and paneer to a large mixing bowl. Mix them well.
- Now top with balsamic vinaigrette dressing and toss.
- Enjoy Roasted Butternut squash quinoa salad!
Nutrition
Notes
- You may use any greens instead of Kale.
- You can use walnuts instead of pecans or completely skip nuts to make it nut-free.
- If you would like to keep this meal vegan, sub out paneer for a vegan cheese or you can completely skip the cheese part. Easy peasy.
- Instead of Balsamic Vinaigrette, you can also use Pumpkin Vinaigrette.
Private Notes
Tried this recipe?
Let us know We would love to hear your thoughts! Please leave your comments, ratings, and any ideas or changes you think could help us make our recipes even better. Thank you for your feedback!Warm regards,
Dhwani.
Oh! This recipe is just amazing.I will surely try this. I went through other recipes too they too were really nice. Healthy salad is just perfect qurantine recipe. I too bake 100% healthy recipes on my site(www.homelyandhealthy.com). Do visit ones. Thank you!