Easy Raw Kale Salad

Superstar vegan blogger Kathy Patalsky—founder of healthyhappylife.com, author of 365 Vegan Smoothies and curator of findingvegan.com—has just released her second cookbook, Healthy Happy Vegan Kitchen!

If you are already familiar with Kathy’s work, you know that her food is bright and fresh, innovative yet approachable, and always served with a side of positive energy and glow. Kathy makes vegan food fun, colorful and an extension of her healthy-happy outlook on life.

Packed with more than 220 recipes, HHVK beautifully showcases Kathy’s culinary point of view. Throughout the pages of her cookbook, she has breathed new life into vegan classics, like 15-Minute Marinara Sauce with Vegan Parmesan, Easy Sweet Potato Chili and Easy Creamy Ranch Dressing; created new twists of her own, like Avocado Caprese Sandwich, Turmeric Hemp White Bean Burger Patties and Blueberry Farro Spinach Salad; and invented dishes that are completely unique, like Pesto Chickpea Bowl, Cinna-Chili Coconut Oil Popcorn and Tofu Feta, Watermelon and Basil Salad.

HHVK is much more than just a pretty book in the fast-growing world of vegan cookbooks. It’s the kind of cookbook that you are actually going to use again and again, because the recipes are not only simple and doable, but also filling, delicious and accessible.

I first tried Kathy’s 5-Step Raw Kale Salad because it looked so colorful and bright, and I had almost all of the ingredients on hand already. You can never go wrong with tahini and kale, and Kathy kicks it up a notch by adding a touch of maple syrup and cayenne that brings everything together and keeps you going back for another bite. I’m super excited that Houghton Mifflin Harcourt has not only allowed me to share the recipe here, but is also offering a free copy of Healthy Happy Vegan Kitchen to one lucky reader through this post!

To enter, just leave a comment below that describes why eating vegan food makes you feel happy and healthy. I’ll randomly choose and announce a winner on Friday, May 8. Shipping is limited to the US. Good luck!

The winner of this giveaway is Amelia, congrats! Thanks to everyone who entered.

For more chances to win, plus five more amazing giveaway items, see Kathy’s Healthy Happy Vegan Blogger Cookbook Tour post!

Table of Contents

5-Step Raw Kale Salad

---

• Author: kathy patalsky
• Yield: 3 servings

Print Recipe

Pin Recipe

Description

Text excerpted from Healthy Happy Vegan Kitchen, © 2015 by Kathy Patalsky.

This salad was a big winner on my blog. Everyone fell in love with the ease of the recipe and the deliciousness of the flavors. When you hear about kale salads being trendy and craveable, this is the type of salad that everyone is referring to! Raw kale marinated or massaged with flavors, tahini or nut butter, avocado, veggies, a sweet accent, and something sassy like lemon juice or apple cider vinegar. Make this your go-to raw kale recipe—it only takes five steps!

---

Ingredients

• 1 bunch kale
• ¾ cups shredded carrots
• 1 small avocado, diced
• ½ cup diced sweet onion

Simple Sweet Tahini Dressing (see note)

• 3 tablespoons fresh lemon juice (or apple cider vinegar or fresh lime juice)
• 2 tablespoons tahini (or substitute with nut or seed butter)
• 2 tablespoons grade B maple syrup
• 2 teaspoons extra-virgin olive oil (optional, adds richness)
• Pinch of freshly grated zest
• 2 pinches cayenne
• Pinch of sea salt and a few pinches freshly ground black pepper
• 2 to 3 tablespoons seeds or nuts (optional)

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

---

Instructions

1. Wash the kale. Run each thick leaf under warm water and massage any grit away. Tear the leaves away from the thick stalks and place them in a large bowl. Rinse and drain the leaves several times until the kale is adequately clean.
2. Drain the water from the bowl for a final time and squeeze the kale dry with a few paper towels. Remove any large pieces of kale from the bowl and finely chop them into long strips. (If you like large pieces of kale you can skip this last chopping step.) You should have 4 to 6 cups of kale.
3. Place the kale, carrots, avocado, and onion in a large bowl.

For the Simple Sweet Tahini Dressing:

1. In a small bowl, whisk the dressing ingredients together.
2. Add the dressing to the bowl of veggies and kale and start tossing. Massage the dressing into the kale with your hands, if you’d like, for more infused flavor. Fluff and toss until the dressing is well absorbed into the greens and veggies. Fold in the seeds, if desired.
3. Cover and refrigerate the salad. Allow at least 1 hour for the dressing to really sink into the ingredients. Plus, chilling everything makes it refreshing and tasty as a cold salad side. You can even make this salad the night before you serve it. Overnight chilling works! The greens should be eaten within a day for the best taste and texture.

Notes

Make a double batch of dressing if you like your greens more heavily dressed.

Tip: You can easily change up the veggies and other addins as desired!

NUTRITION FACTS
(per serving–235g)
Calories: 259
Fat: 17g
Carbs: 23g
Protein: 5g
Fiber: 8g
Vitamin C: 207%
Iron: 12%
Calcium: 15%
Vitamin A: 369%

Kathy Patalsky is the creator of the vegan food blog Healthy. Happy. Life. and is the author of the cookbooks 365 Vegan Smoothies and Healthy Happy Vegan Kitchen.Kathy is also the founder of the popular website FindingVegan.com which launched the Finding Vegan App in 2015. Kathy’s recipes and photography work have been featured in Saveur, BuzzFeed, LATimes, Fox, CNN, on the cover of VegNews, Channel 8’s Connecticut Style and more. Kathy grew up a block from the beach in the farmer’s market savvy, laidback, surfer’s paradise town of Santa Cruz California. She graduated with a degree in Health Promotion from American University in Washington DC. Kathy also spent a year studying art at Otis School of Art and Design.

Her blog is a merging of her favorite things: art, food, wellness, a love of animals and the environment and people.