Gena Hamshaw is a registered dietitian nutritionist, recipe developer, and the author of Food52 Vegan (2017) and Power Plates (2018). She shares vegan recipes on her blog, The Full Helping, which she has written since 2009. Gena lives in New York City. Her recipes and articles have been featured in the Huffington Post, Whole Living, O magazine, VegNews, Thrive magazine, Well and Good, Mind Body Green, Glamour, and the Chalkboard, among other publications.
“I earned my Master of Science in Nutrition from Teachers College, Columbia University. I went on to complete my dietetic internship with Teachers College. My internship training included rotations at Brookdale University Hospital Medical Center, the John Theurer Cancer Center, East River Gastroenterology, and the Institute for Family Health. I hold a premedical, post-baccalaureate degree from Georgetown University. I spent two years as a nutrition counselor in the office of gastroenterologist Robynne Chutkan, MD, specializing in dietary management of digestive disorders,” says Hamshaw.
“This salad is big on texture and flavor. It was created with Middle Eastern influences in mind, namely the za’atar spice on the roasted veggies and the swirl of harissa in the tahini dressing. I love these flavors, and they add so much character to a simple marriage of ingredients. Other ingredients: cauliflower, of course. The cauliflower gives the salad substance and lots of good nutrition; cauliflower is a good source of fiber, Vitamin C, Vitamin K, and folate. I add lentils to the za’atar roasted cauliflower salad. You can use brown, green, pardina, or black (beluga) lentils. I don’t recommend red lentils, which are too mushy to work in a salad like this. I top this salad with a lemony, spicy harissa tahini dressing. The harissa is optional if you don’t have it—garlic and lemon and creamy tahini go a long way—but it adds a lot of character to the dressing,” she adds.
Ingredients:
3/4 cup dry lentils (brown, green, French, pardina, or beluga)
