This Taco Salad with Tofu Chorizo is hearty, delicious, and super easy to throw together. The highlights of this salad include vegan shredded cheese, a base of crispy romaine, and a flavorful tofu chorizo. Perfect addition to your weekly meal prep!
Tofu Chorizo
There are so many creative meat alternatives out there – as glad as I am there are meat alternatives such as Beyond and Impossible, they aren’t exactly healthy. Meat alternatives are highly processed and packed with chemicals – just as real meat is damaging to the body, fake meats can also cause major digestion issues, obesity, heart disease, high blood pressure, etc.
If you don’t like tofu, there are plenty of other whole foods you can use to imitate meat including quinoa, walnut, mushroom, and seitan. My secret ingredient in making taco “meat” is cumin!
Taco Salad Substitutions
Taco salad is a pretty broad salad and can be interpreted hundreds of different ways. In fact, I have a couple variations myself right here on the blog:
- Taco Salad with Quinoa Meat. This taco salad is packed with flavor – pan fried spicy corn, puffed tofu bites, tangy tahini dressing, and of course the quinoa meat. If you’re not a fan of tofu, swap it for the quinoa meat!
- Chipotle Burrito Bowl. This bowl is a healthy knockoff of Chipotle’s Burrito Bowl. It’s got creamy black beans, blistered peppers and onions, the softest cauliflower rice, and tossed with Trader Joe’s Spicy Cashew Dressing.
- Vegan Fajita Del Rey. If you live in Southern California, you’re probably familiar with Tocaya Organica. That’s where this bowl originates from! It technically doesn’t call for lettuce, but make a shredded romaine base and you’ve got yourself a taco salad. This one is pretty similar to the Chipotle Burrito Bowl – it’s got cheesy black beans, seitan chorizo, Mexican style cauliflower rice, and is topped with chipotle vegan mayo.
My absolute favorite part of this recipe is the vegan shredded cheese! I typically meal prep this salad and reheat for 2-3 minutes when I’m ready to eat it, and the cheese melted on top is to die for. Brands of vegan cheese I trust:
As always, avoid brands that have toxic chemicals and ingredients you can’t pronounce. Brands I avoid include:
- Daiya
- Follow Your Heart
- Go Veggie
Taco Salad with Tofu Chorizo
Ingredients
Salad Ingredients
- 1/4 cup brown or cauliflower rice
- 1/2 green bell pepper
- 1/2 orange bell pepper
- 1/4 cup corn
- 1/4 cup black beans
- 1 corn tortilla cut into thin strips
- 1 head romaine lettuce cut into shreds
- 1/2 lime
- 1 tbsp fresh cilantro
- 1/4 jalapeño pepper optional
- 2 tbsp shredded vegan cheese
Tofu Chorizo
- 1/4 block super firm tofu
- 3/4 tsp cumin
- 1/2 tsp garlic powder
- 1/2 tsp paprika
- 1/2 tbsp avocado oil
Dressing
- 1 tbsp vegan mayonnaise I use Primal Kitchen. can sub for cashew cream
- 1/2 tsp chipotle powder
- 1 tbsp lime juice
- 1-3 tbsp filtered water adjust depending on how thick you want your dressing
Instructions
- cook brown rice. drain and rinse the black beans and corn then chop the bell peppers
- spray a pan with oil spray (I used avocado) and sauté the bell peppers. set aside
- use a fork to crumble the tofu. add to a small bowl and toss with seasoning. sauté in the avocado oil until crispy then set aside
- cut the corn tortilla into strips and place in your air fryer or oven at 400 degrees and bake until crispy, about 10-15 minutes. serve in strips or crumble them with your hand (as pictured)
- arrange ingredients in a bowl. top with the dressing, 1/2 a lime, and sea salt
Notes
