The Ultimate Vegan Salad with Bacon & Feta

Long gone are the days of basic boring vegan salads. This salad is on a bed of massaged kale topped with vegan bacon and vegan feta cheese!

Let’s talk about vegan bacon!

In the past vegan bacon has always felt tasted very in “bacony.“ Then A few brand came out and they were usually full of soy of gluten, which is a big no-no for me. Especially with a soy allergy. After a while I started experimenting with making my own with mushrooms, eggplant, coconut, and my favorite rice paper. I loved all of them but to be honest. I hated all the extra steps I had to take to make them.

Now the game has gotten much easier because of Hooray Foods Plant Based Bacon (….and no they’re not paying or sponsoring me). I stumbled upon it shopping at Whole foods recently and the rest s history. It’s super easy to make and tastes so good! Now I can get super creative with recipes without the extra steps!

Making The Hooray Foods Bacon is so easy. The first thing you will want to do is let the package sit at room temperature for about 10 minutes to soften. Then just add it to a skillet on medium high heat for about 2 minutes on each side or until crispy. I always like to add salt and pepper to mine while its cooking. Then you remove it from the pan and let it cool for a few minutes. Then I just used a knife and chopped it into crumbles.

Now Let’s Talk About Vegan Feta Cheese!

I‘ve seen several brands pop up in the market but most of them contained soy so they never made it to my table! Finally, one of my favorite vegan cheese brands Follow Your Heart came out with Vegan Feta Crumbles and in my opinion its the best on the market. It has the tang and texture of traditional feta cheese. The Violife brand of vegan feta is great too. You can find them both at Whole Foods.

How to make this salad

Making this salad is super easy and completely customizable. Here is what I used:

• 1/2 Bag of chopped kale

• 1 can of chickpeas washed and drained

• 1/4 cup of thinly sliced red onion

• 1/4 cup of sun dried tomatoes

• 1 cup of fresh tomatoes

• 1 cup of chopped cucumbers

• 1 container of vegan feta cheese

• 5 pieces of vegan bacon chopped

• 3 tbs extra virgin olive oil

• 1 tbs of nutritional yeast

• The juice of one lemon

• salt to taste

Preparation:

1. First make your bacon by adding it to skillet on medium high heat. Cook for about 2 minutes on each side.

2. Remove the bacon from the skillet and let it cool for a few minutes the crumble it up and set it aside.

3. Now add the kale to a large bowl and add in the lemon juice, nutritional yeast, extra virgin olive oil and about 1/2 tsp of salt and gently massage everything together for about 2 minutes. this will soften the kale and make it nice and tender as well.

4. Next add the remaining veggies to the bowl and mix well.

5. Top with the vegan feta and bacon crumbles. Mix well and enjoy.