Name: Beetroot Chickpea Salad with Zoodles & Tahini
Prep time: 35 min
Total time: 35 min
Yield: 4 portions
Ingredients: 2 medium zucchinis; 3 medium beets; 400 g 1 can chickpeas (rinsed, patted dry with a paper towel); Olive oil; 1 teaspoon ground ginger; 2/3 teaspoon each ground coriander and cumin; 1/2 teaspoon each cayenne pepper, (onion granules and garlic powder); Sea salt and pepper to taste; 1 tablespoon tahini paste; 5 tablespoons lemon juice; 5 tablespoons vegetable oil; 1 tablespoon honey (or maple syrup); To serve: chopped cilantro, (thinly sliced green chillis, crumbled/cubed feta, sesame seeds.)

Jump to Recipe Print Recipe

This roasted beetroot chickpea salad with spiralized zucchini and feta makes a delicious, light yet satisfying meal. Enjoy with a drizzle of simple tahini dressing.

This roasted beetroot chickpea salad makes a delicious, satisfying yet light meal, perfect for this time of year. It does involve a bit of preparation – slicing, spirilizing as well as roasting – but I promise it’s worth the effort! Besides, the beets, chickpeas as well as the dressing can be made ahead so putting the salad together takes minutes.

Prepping the beets for beetroot chickpea salad

I used roasted beets in this zoodles salad recipe. Simply peel the beets, cut into wedges, sprinkle with spices, drizzle over a bit of oil and bake for about 25 minutes. You can add it into the salad hot, straight from the oven, or cooled. If you choose the latter option you can roast the beets ahead and just add into the salad when you are ready to serve it.

Prepping the chickpeas

One thing to keep in mind is that the chickpeas should be completely dry before being fried so that they get crispy rather than soggy in the frying pan. Before you fry them spread them on a sheet of paper towel and pat dry. If possible leave them to dry for about 30 minutes and then wipe any remaining moisture with a paper towel.

The chickpeas, similarly to the beets, can be added into the salad either hot, straight from the pan, or cooled. So if you prefer the latter make them ahead to use later.

Using zoodles in salad recipes

Zucchini is one of the best vegetables for spirilizing. It has the right shape and texture for spiralizing and can be enjoyed raw in salads as well as main dishes. You can add it to your spiralized vegetable soup, low carb healthy alfredo sauce, or use in this spiralized salad with blueberries. It takes seconds to turn into veggie spaghetti and looks fantastic in any dish. Because of its mild, fairly bland flavour, it can be combined with virtually any ingredients. It works really well in this beetroot and chickpeas salad.

Quick and easy tahini dressing

The dressing is really simple and complements all the other flavours in this zucchini salad incredibly well. It takes about 2 minutes to put together, contains only 4 ingredients and can be made ahead so it’s really convenient.

Putting the salad together

Once you’ve roasted your beets, fried the chickpeas and prepared the dressing (remember you can do this all in advance!) putting this chickpea salad together is a breeze! Simply spiralize the zucchini, combine with the beets and chickpeas, add your chosen toppings (see ideas below), drizzle over the dressing and enjoy!

Toppings ideas for beetroot chickpea salad

This spiralized zucchini salad is really versatile and can be enjoyed with a number of toppings. One of them is feta. It adds a nice tang to the flavour combination and complements the sweet earthy beetroot and nutty chickpeas really well. You may also scatter toasted seeds and/or nuts, as well as thinly sliced green chillies for a bit of bite, over the salad just before serving.

It is up to you which of my serving suggestions you decide to use, though I have to say I’ve included a bit of each in my salad and was very happy with the result. They add complexity both in texture as well as flavour and go extremely well with the main salad ingredients.

Enjoy beetroot chickpea salad either vegetarian or vegan

You can swap the feta for tofu and enjoy this zucchini salad vegan. Or you can omit either of these ingredients altogether. Also it’s absolutely fine to use maple or agave syrup instead of honey in the dressing.

If you like this recipe you might also like Baked Beetroot and Feta Pasta Salad.

Check out also this roundup of 15 easy veggie spaghetti spiralizer recipes as well as easy vegan salads.