Recipe: Roasted Cauliflower and Chickpea Taco Bowls

I’m what you’d call a lazy cook. If you haven’t realized that already about me by looking at Arlington Darling’s recipe collection, you’ll figure it out soon enough! I like recipes with few ingredients, short instructions lists, and that require little prep work. I do try to strike a balance between using prepackaged/processed food and putting a recipe together from scratch with 100% fresh food, but when push comes to shove I am just not the woman making her own yogurt with bacterial cultures or frying her own tortilla chips out of cut up tortillas, I’m just not.

So, when I see a recipe that calls for taco shells, I’m pretty likely to think “meh, I don’t want to make individual tacos I’ll just throw everything into a bowl. Taco shells sound complicated and hard to take with me for lunch.” And so this dish was born!

Laziness is delicious. Mmmmm.

Roasted Cauliflower and Chickpea Taco Bowls

Ingredients:
1 can chickpeas, rinsed and drained and patted dry
1/2 head of cauliflower, chopped into small florets
2 avocados, cubed
1/2 head of red/purple cabbage, shredded
1 cup Greek yogurt
2 limes, zest and juice
2 tbsp. olive oil
1 bunch fresh cilantro, chopped
1 tsp chili powder
1 tsp cumin
1/4 tsp onion powder
1/4 tsp garlic powder
1/4 tsp salt

To Make:
1. Preheat the oven to 400 degrees. Combine chickpeas, cauliflower, seasonings (you can even add a further shortcut and use your favorite taco seasoning instead), olive oil, and lime juice in a bowl. Toss, and then spread on baking sheet and roast in the oven for 20-25 minutes, stirring once, until crispy and browned at the edges.
2. Meanwhile, make the dressing (don’t be tempted to leave this step out, see above about how I’m lazy and trust me that this small extra effort is easy and worth it for the dish). Combine Greek yogurt, lime zest, cilantro, and a dash of salt and pepper. Let rest in the fridge.
3. When ready to serve, add portions of the cauliflower and chickpeas, shredded cabbage, and avocado to a bowl or shallow dish. Dress with the yogurt dressing.

A couple of substitutions that would work for this dish that I thought of: sub another leafy green for the cabbage, although I really appreciate the tang of it and the chance to eat a beautiful purple veggie. Or you could add a meat to the bowl instead or in addition to the cauliflower, if you eat meat.

Note. If you’re packing these into Tupperware for your lunches, as I do, keep the dressing in a separate container until that morning and cut up one avocado at a time, as needed.

Recipe adapted from Two Peas and their Pod.

Enjoy!!