16 Spring Recipes To Add to Your Meal Plan This Season
Spring is in the air and it’s a great time to change up that meal plan by introducing the best that this season has to offer.
Some of the season’s highlights include strawberries, artichokes, asparagus, spinach, swiss chard, green peas, green beans and agretti. Mother nature doesn’t leave anything to chance and much of what she has to offer from season to season plays a vital role in helping us stay in harmony with her energy so that we feel our best.
Carrots, although available year round, are delicious this time of year, as they can be used to add extra crunch and colour to a salad. You can also find immature “baby” carrots this time of year, with their green carrot tops. They can be roasted whole and their tops can be used to make a delicious carrot top pesto.
Although fennel and orange are technically part of the winter line up, they’re still in season this time of year and a delicious addition to your meal.
While onions, shallots and garlic are widely available year round, the fresh spring alliums like leeks, ramps, green garlic, spring onions and scallions are at their peek in the spring and make an excellent addition to any meal from a flavour and nutrition perspective.
Below are 16 spring recipes to add to your meal plan rotation this season.
This baked pasta with artichokes, leeks and saffron bechamel is a great way to celebrate and showcase fresh artichokes when they’re in season. While there’s some effort involved in preparing the fresh artichokes, it’s well worth it. The saffron bechamel is vegan, oil, gluten and grain free and comes together in just a few minutes.
2. Baked Stuffed Artichokes
This seasonal dish makes a great center of the table main course. Artichokes are stuffed with a mixture of almonds, bread crumbs pine nuts and herbs and seasoned with salt, pepper and my vegan walnut parm, layered over a bed of brown, red, and wild rice with spinach and baked to perfection.
3. Savoury Greens Galette
A good savoury galette should be a part of everyone’s meal repertoire. While they’re certainly not as “easy” to throw together as a one pot soup or a quick pasta, they’re simple enough and make for an impressive center of the table meal that looks way more complex to make than it really is. You really don’t even need a recipe once you’ve learned to make a savoury galette. The process is quite simple, once you’ve got a pie crust and your favourite vegetables cooked.
4. Cannellini Bean & Carrot Tart
This savoury tart is made with a cispy cracker thin buckwheat walnut crust, filled with creamy cannellini beans and topped shaved thyme carrots. It’s delicate and delicious, kid, picky eater and bean hater friendly, completely plant based and gluten free. It’s a perfect addition to a pot luck, dinner party or weeknight dinner with minimal prep that can be done in advance.
5. Dairy Free Vegetarian Quiche
This dairy free vegetarian quiche is loaded with vegetables and comes packaged in a flaky olive oil spelt crust. Even if you’ve never made a quiche before, this recipe is a guaranteed success. It’s easy, nutritious and delicious. You can make it for a weeknight dinner, or prepare it in advance. The beauty of quiche is that it does keep well and taste amazing the next few days, straight out of the refrigerator (yes cold) or warmed up slightly in the oven. You can grab a slice for a quick breakfast, pack it for lunch or make it ahead for any dinner, lunch, brunch or party.
6. Agretti with Sundried Tomatoes & Quinoa Pasta
Agretti or Monk’s Beard, is a wildly delicious and nutritious weed that grows in Italian marshlands and the mediterranean basin. It’s tangy and a bit sour when eaten raw and has a delicate flavour reminscent of spinach when cooked. It’s highly nutritious, rivaling many of the dark leafy greens and makes a great addition to your spring time meal repertoire.
7. Strawberry & Asparagus Quinoa Salad
Asparagus are lightly sauteed with shallots and sea salt and deglazed with white balsamic vinegar until tender but still crisp, then tossed with herbamare seasoned black & white quinoa and topped with lemon juice, more white balsamic vinegar, a drizzle of extra virgin olive oil to keep things nice and fluffy, some chopped fresh mint and parsley, chopped walnuts and fresh strawberries. Spring perfection in a bowl with a good dose of protein, fiber and healthy fats and an array of vitamins and minerals to keep you balanced.
8. Lentil, Carrot & Fennel Salad
This lentil, quick pickled carrot and fennel salad is light yet satiating all at once, and full of flavour and crunch factor from the quick pickled veggies. It keeps well in the refrigerator and stays crunchy even the next day.
9. Orange & Fennel Salad
This salad is refreshing, crisp and sweet and loaded with vitamin C from both fennel and oranges. The sweetness is balanced out with a light and tangy white balsamic and thyme vinaigrette. It makes a perfect starter or side salad.
10. Sumac Roasted Carrot & Cannellini Bean Spread
This spread is perfect for a picnic, on your favourite sanwich or served with crackers and crudités. It's a wonderful appetizer, makes a great addition to the buffet table at a party and a wonderful picnic companion. It's loaded with the goodness of roasted heirloom carrots, creamy cannellini beans and deliciously tangy and sumac spice. It's so good you'll want to spread it on everything.
11. Artichoke & Pistachio Tapenade
This bright green tapenade is loaded with the goodness of artichokes, pistachios, and parsley with a rich texture and hints of lemon and garlic. It's guaranteed to be an impressive appetizer and crowd pleaser at your next gathering and it’s a great condiment to keep on hand for spreading on sandwiches and crackers.
12. Coconut Chia Pudding with Seasonal Fruit
Chia pudding is one of my favourite breakfast or snack foods. I love how easy it is to make, store and personalize and the fact that it’s loaded with healthy fats, protein and fiber to keep you satiated for hours. It’s a great addition to your breakfast repertoire once the weather starts to warm up and you need something fresh. Pair it with fresh seasonal fruit for a delicious and satisfying breakfast or snack.
13. Tahini, Orange Blossom & Amaranth Granola
This oil free, refined sugar free granola is made with naturally gluten free and nutrient rich puffed amaranth and rolled oats and infused with the aroma and flavour of orange blossom water and tahini. Crushed pistachios and cranberries are added for extra flavour and texture to round out the granola.
14. Strawberry Tahini Crisp
This strawberry crisp is vegan friendly, oil free, and gluten free if you use certified gluten free oats. The tahini not only acts as a binder for the topping ingredients, but also adds a whole other dimension of flavour that complements the natural sweetness of the strawberries.
15. Strawberry, Vanilla & Orange Blossom Cake
This cake is light and fluffy yet moist, with the intoxicating aroma of orange blossom water which pairs beautifully with fresh strawberries, as pictured here, but also works wonderfully with peaches, nectarines, apricots, or raspberries, so go ahead and swap out the fruit based on what you have on hand and what’s in season.
16. Orange Loaf Cake
This whole spelt vegan orange loaf cake with orange coconut cream frosting is a delicious dessert this time of year and a great break from all the rich chocolate. It’s light and bright and makes great use of citrus which is abundant this time of year.
